Daily Blues & Views

I've been volunteering at my neighborhood elementary school.  There is a program called SMART, an acronym for Start Making a Reader Today.  I read with and to kindergarten kids for an hour.  I have three charges, all girls, and I spend 20 minutes with each, one day a week.  It goes quickly, most of the time.  These kids can't read yet, but they are learning to love books.  We read together whatever they choose from among hundreds of titles distributed around the small classroom.  Most of the books are clever little titles that can be read in about 5-7 minutes.  I did read one last week that was 48 pages long.  It took almost the entire 20-minute segment. My three "Smarties," as they are called, couldn't be more different.  The first little girl is very quiet and shy.  But she smiles freely and responds to my occasional questions with bright, alert, answers.  I've learned her favorite foods, animals, and colors.  The third...

I used to explore the theme of childhood with my Junior English classes.  In literature, it's very popular...also a winner.  Everybody has one.  Everybody loses one.  The stories are important and valuable.  Usually, when teaching the novel The Catcher in the Rye, I'd ask my students to bring in an object that represents their childhood.  I'd do the same.  This exercise came early on in the year and would work as an ice-breaker and help us all get to know one another better.  Of course, there was all manner of Barbie dolls, and model cars, airplanes, rocket ships, and superhero toys.  Some kids would bring books and others went conceptual, like the student who poured a container of water through the air into a container and said that water represented his childhood because he almost drowned.  One of the most memorable was the student who brought in some clothing from her native Iran and proceded to tell a story about how she and her...

I'm seen as an old man named after an uncle I never met, If promise was a flood, and fire was frost Twilight would be more than life-like dreams  that bubble over the ledges of time Give me the uniform of a minor league team that exists only in the mind, Just one more look to hold dear, with colors that make this life half as hard. As a young man, my lovers came mostly from ancient cultures but others from those busy being born, Most were restless within own their own boundaries, If I never wandered through dark woods the most beautiful would never have appeared.  Eventually, I moved on and away as they pushed years along like a noisy shopping cart. Old photos bring new smiles.