#181: I Am From Jarmers

On the very first days with my sophomores in the new school year, I asked them to write some goals for themselves, things they wanted to learn or accomplish in the new year in English Language Arts. I gave them the spiel that often goals are stupid things because we allow them to slip away or think of all kinds of excuses to put them off, especially if those goals are only in our heads.  It’s one thing to “think” a goal, it’s another thing, a better thing, to write it down, and it’s still a better thing to say it out loud to someone who might be able to hold you accountable or give you encouragement and help. And I also try to avoid asking students to do things that I would not be willing to do myself.  So, I wrote my own goal for the year–and because it’s personal, therefore meaningful, it won’t work for one of the goals I set for my administrators (go figure)–but in the effort to make it stick, I shared it with my sophomores. My goal this year is to write more often with my students.

We began with a poem by George Ella Lyon, “Where I’m From,” which has been used I think a gazillion times by teachers as a model for student writing about their origins, literal and figurative origins. We read the poem, observed its various moves and strategies, and then wrote our own.  Mine turned out nicely, I think.  But check out the original, too, by Lyon.  It’s better.

I Am From Jarmers

I am from the Oak,
the giant Oak in my yard
that’s stood there for decades,
maybe centuries.

I am from stuffed animals
piled up on the bed.
I am from Star Trek and
I Dream of Jeanie.

I am from an above ground
swimming pool,
long summer days in
the heat, in and out
of the water 10 or 15
times every day.  

I am from babysitters
covered in tanning oil.
I am from Risley Park
where a gigantic teepee
used to stand, gone now
for twenty years.

I am from camping in the woods
and at the beach  
and from a Father who loved
the outdoors
and a Mother who loved
almost everything and every one.

I am from alcohol.

I am from Jarmers.  

I am from Catholicism,
the quiet, the ritual,
the family car ride
every Sunday to Mass.
I am from the fear
of Satan and wonder
at my brother the born-again.

I am from music of the last half
of the twentieth century;
I am from punk and new wave.

I am from the drums,
from blistered hands and
sizzling cymbals and
punctured bass drum heads.
I am from ringing ears.

I am from the middle class.
I am from dumb luck
and Rex Putnam High School
and Clackamas Community College
and Lewis and Clark College
and Warren Wilson College,
all these places making me human,
giving me a life to live.