25 February 2010
For Most this Amazing Day
Filed under work
Woo. Stayed up ’til past 3:00 last night. I’d put in late hours getting ready for an excursion and then remembered that I’d hoped to finish this spreadsheet I’d promised for my colleagues. By the time I wrapped myself up in my comfy bed it was just about time to get up.
The excursion was good. Because of some budget cuts this year, I didn’t get to do my Poetry Day activity and was asked instead to combine my excursion with another English teacher’s poetry excursion and with the photography classes’ trip to Waimea Valley.
I love that valley, but my excursion was supposed to be urban and kind of rebellious. Writing poetry in a valley near a falls is not as cool as what I usually do with my students. But difficult times call for sacrifices, so we went to the valley with the other classes. It amounted to close to forty percent of our student body. All my cool poetry wasn’t going to work so I had to come up with nature stuff, which of course there is no shortage of, but I’d been trying to stay away from the dead white guys.
I ended up going with the usual suspects: “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” (Frost), “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time” (Herrick), “Me and You” (Dwyer), and “i thank you God for most this amazing day” (cummings). Then I assigned a couple of writing assignments and set the students loose in the valley. Later, they had the run of Haleiwa town for lunch and amazingly, they were all back on the bus five minutes before they were due.
So a good day, but I am sooooooooo tired!
2010-02-25 :: me