Most of my day is noisy. Kids make strange sounds I don’t really understand the purpose of. Chatter winds up to a not necessary volume. The class next door thunders down the stairs. Transitions happen where everyone is talking and nobody is moving. There are also the meaningful conversations that are full of passion and questions and gasping and talking over to be heard. Loud.

Or it’s completely quiet. We breathe together as part of our mindfulness practice. There are silent moments during a read aloud where everyone feels everything and nobody breathes at all. Only flipping pages can be heard when we are all lost in our books.  Peace.

There is usually no in between. It’s all about revving up or calming it down. I try to navigate us back to at least a quiet hum. Not always successfully.

Noisy days broken up by quiet moments. This is the rhythm of school.

It’s not often I get to have a tiny conversation with just one child. When I do, it feels like a stolen moment. Extra precious. It’s like the loud and the quiet stop. The noise in the room is irrelevant. It’s all about the one child telling me a little piece of his or her truth.

I listen especially carefully. Things that are shared with me are gifts. I accept each one as such. The words are only a few sentences in total. What I learn goes way beyond.

“You are usually pretty nice to me,” one little guy tells me quite often. I take this to mean that he feels safe in our room. He has a pretty regular litany of complaints about all the people who were mean or who didn’t have manners or might have asked him to do something in the wrong way. If I could, I would wrap him in a box marked “Fragile. Handle with care.” I wear my pretty nice badge with pride.

What is shared is often told with a bent head and a hushed tone. It’s private. Just for me.

“I read my book last night at home. Two chapters.  It was really noisy. But I found a way to do it. I whispered the words to myself and then I could only hear the book.” I know how big this is for this child who so wants to read at home but can never find a quiet space in her noisy house. My suggestions would have been meaningless. She found her own way.

I love when they tell me things in dreamy ways.

“I can’t wait until we read the novel again. How can that Mom even be like that? I wish there was a way to really actually save a book character. I wish we could.” We are reading The War That Saved my Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley and my students are so completely appalled by the abusive nature of Ada’s mother. I am not surprised that this book is occupying their thoughts. I am touched that they share it with me. I am thrilled that books are bringing us to places where our empathy for others grows.

I feel blessed that I get to listen. Lucky that they share. I wait for what is told to me in the in-between places.

I am participating in the Slice of Life challenge to write and publish a post every day in March.

Slice of Life is hosted by Two Writing Teachers. I thank them for the community they provide. Read more slices here.

It is always so strange to me that words hold such power. They evoke emotion. Inspire change. Promote questions. Yet they also work in reverse. When we use our words to describe our fears, our worries, our doubts –  we pull out the power.

Fears shrink.

Worries lessen.

Doubts lose momentum.

The big and scary slowly deflates.

Placing it on the page is like challenging all of the negative to a draw. A stand off. Walk away. Turn and face. Big breath.

I begin day one of this month long writing journey by letting the doubts have their space. If I can leave them mostly on the page maybe they’ll stay out of my head. Not interfere. Not make me freeze.

But they are here now. Questioning me. Focusing my gaze on the negatives. They are numerous.

Words have left me.

Images are muddled.

I have no more stories to tell.

Last year words saved me. They held me up. They settled the angst. I told my way out of the hard stuff. The words led me through changes.  A new job. A new place. They helped me find my way. They shone the light where I needed to look. They soothed me.

Now, words seem to be running away. Or running by. I can’t catch them. They race at me and throw themselves all over the floor. When I try to pick them up, they slither away, What’s left holds little meaning. Words right now seem confusing.

Words are too complicated. They tangle around themselves when I am looking for the simple. The one word. The ability to name. Not even the answer but at least the nuance of the question. They won’t come to me. They resist. They make me doubt that I could ever tame them at all.

I remember those feelings of capturing truth. Sticking it on the page syllable by syllable. Holding it there with images that settled into rhythms. It never seemed easy but it seemed possible. I wasn’t scared away moments after beginning.

Words have visited me here and there in this past year. Always they came when I needed them most. Now, perhaps they are so elusive because I don’t need them as desperately. I just want them. They are determined to make me work.

I see the words standing facing me. And if I am honest, I can make out what they are saying. They aren’t really gone. But I have to walk towards them. They reside where it’s hard.

The face off is against vulnerability.

Mine.

So I need to find brave. Hold my stare. Resist avoidance.

Walk towards the complicated stuff.

And then, the words will come.

I am participating in the Slice of Life challenge to write and publish a post every day in March.

Slice of Life is hosted by Two Writing Teachers. I thank them for the community they provide. Read more slices here.