Notes from the Forest

"What did you do at school today?" "nothing" "Did you sing any songs?" "nope" "Did your teacher tell you any stories?" "no, she never does" "Did you hike anywhere?" "no" "Who did you play with?" "no one plays with me ever" At Oak Hill we are proud to say, we do nothing. The more rambunctious they are as they fly out of their vehicles into our arms, the more dysregulated the group is as we attempt to corral them for our morning greeting circle,  the less we do! After our Morning Verse accompanied by a big Joyful Jump to 'greet the morning sun', we will do some mindfulness exercises; close our eyes and breathe. What can we hear? Voices resting, just listen! Can you hear the creek? The mourning doves? the ravens? Let's have one minute of golden silence; turn your face to the sun, close your eyes and just feel the warmth on your cheeks..... breathe in, smell the rose, blow it out...

I recently witnessed a family at a random lake somewhere in the area, children digging, playing happily and absorbed and mom and grandparents reading on the beach. Suddenly the children started laughing at their shenanigans and mom jumped up, pulling out her phone, and said 'wait, hold on guys....'  Phone up and in place she said 'ok, carry on lol' (yes, she said lol) and the children resumed their tumbling and cavorting, but as you can probably imagine it was very different. In a word, it was fake. When they were 'done' they ran to mom, crowding around her beach chair asking to see it. "Are you going to post it?" "Post it mom, share it! I want Ms....... to see it!"  I drove home thinking this scene over, and I had a few thoughts on the matter; The most beautiful and therefore most valuable play happens when children are truly immersed in their actions. Removed from the goings on around them, and completely lost in their 'story', eith...

  Isn't it funny.... ...that while you're in the midst of raising your family, fully entrenched, stepping on lego pieces in the dark; tiny, bony knees and elbows in your back as you cling to the edge of your bed praying that you can get back to sleep despite zero real estate on your king sized mattress; using the inside of your sweatshirt to catch a particularly wet sneeze as it exits your little cherub's nose in the middle of a concert/gallery/church service/story time at the library; reading yet another note home from school that 'head lice was found on one of your child's classmates'; reaching under your car seat to retrieve your sunglasses, your hand lands on something decidedly organic and smooshy; and  the list goes on.... ...isn't it funny that at these moments when you sigh deeply, and maybe even utter a curse or two under your breath about 'no more nice things' or 'never again a sense of adult autonomy' and wonder whether your deligh...