Today my classroom is filled with teens and words and art and posters and wood and windows open to the ever-changing sky. This place is one that I have spent close to 200 days a year for 3 decades and has evolved some but mostly stayed very much the same. It pulls me back every August and from within this space one can watch all four seasons come into view and famish into the next. There is often laughter and silliness and curiosity and challenges too. We sit in a circle but that changes too. In this English class there are 20 of us forming thoughts and plotting out ideas and becoming a learning community. It feels a bit daunting at the start of any school year, and today is no different. But time, like water, will soften those anxieties and bring us across the rough spots. My room has wood floors and magnificently tall windows. Along the other three walls hangs student art, much of it reflecting a novel’s theme or character, done in a variety of mediums from collage to watercolor to paint, all adding life and color to the century old walls. The blackboards are covered over but I use the space to share various ideas I want students to consider. This year there is now a wall caddy for cell phones, much to the dismay of many who wish not to surrender theirs, but doing so does help keep a semblance of focus. A classroom is a living breathing place which is always worth a look around. I appreciate mine.

Day 2 begins with a 7 minute write and we are off, writing into fiction or memory. I once again hear the tap of keys, some with a light touch, others with a thud, some with speed and urgency, others with a deliberate tap or sporadic pace: regardless the sound is exhilarating. Most students are with me, entering into a sphere of creative energy. Most are looking inward while their fingers move and words are formed, reliving or inventing a time different than the one in which we sit. I glance up from time to time to catch the eyes of someone not writing. Those students are not used to capturing the running thoughts or maybe stumble over the articulation of their ideas or perhaps find imagination uncomfortable. Those students let their eyes lift and dart around with worry stretched across their brow. I smile as our gaze meets. I know they will come around. We have time to spark all the possibilities, I mean, the school year is just starting after all. We have months and seasons and plenty of time ahead.

I can’t deny I love the sound of fingers hitting the keys echoing in the silence of this airy space. I let my own thought and dreams run wild during those 7 minute writes too. I write among them, my mind racing across paper more often than not, straight into whatever fancy I fancy. Surely a gift in the midst of my bustling day, like a tiny box which opens to reveal a whole universe within. Never something to regret.

** Rainbow photo taken by my colleague. Pretty amazing, right? We learn in a magical space.