Thoughts From the West

I compose this at somewhere near 30,000 feet and somewhere between Atlanta and Denver.  My flight home was delayed by a late arriving plane.  Then, once everyone was seated and we got onto the runway, the pilot announced a weather delay.  I slid open my window to see a downpour and huge puddles.  We sat on the runway for about thirty minutes until we were cleared for takeoff.  At takeoff there was a very loud hum on my side near the engine and people around me were nervously wondering what it was and looking around. I'll be asking my personal aircraft mechanic when I get home.  We are now in and out of clouds and turbulence.  It is probably one of the worst flights I've been on in terms of weather.  There is a man sitting near me that may either pass out or throw up.  People are getting anxious.  They are getting out of their seats and the flight attendants announce for them to return to no avail.  The pilot finally got on and gave ...

This summer I've been struck by the permanency of the written word and its ability to convey deep thoughts and make them visible to others long after I leave this Earth.  Please indulge me as I write a personal post. When I was 15 years old I got a crush on a boy.  I didn't understand it really.  I just knew that every time I saw him I got flushed and acted like an idiot.  I briefly dated a friend of his.  This allowed me to spend even more time with him.  He and his friends called me "mouse" because of my small stature.  I saw a gentle soul, one that knew how to have fun but also had a deeper understanding of life than most at that age.  I saw a young man who would bitterly defend anyone from bullying and tried to treat all with respect.  One who would play on a team and fight to win but would be the first to console everyone in a loss and help them to put it into perspective.   Our first date was to the drive in movie to see "...

How many times did I hear that in my elementary classrooms over the years?  I have been wanting to get back to my blog and I sat down this afternoon to do so.  I immediately thought, "I don't know what to write about."  That's not accurate.  I have so many things to write about that the ideas are clogging up my head. This summer has been one of growth in my writing and my desire to write and I have a list of things I want to write about.  I recently went on an organization kick (I'm a west!) and cleaned and organized drawers, cupboards, and closets.  I found so many pieces of my history to write about.  I relived happy memories of my children when they were small.  I located my treasured picture of my dad at 18 in his army uniform.  I've had some painful experiences lately that have brought important life lessons I could process and share.  I have some really funny stories to pen.  I have so much to write about that it's difficult t...

There's something about writing something down.  It becomes a permanent record of your thoughts.  It is physical evidence of a life lived, an opinion held, a difference made.  Don't we always ask people to "put it in writing" as a method for cementing a decision or agreement?  The written word reveals and is binding.  It makes the invisible visible.   Lately I've been trying to write daily.  It is important to practice my craft even on days when the words won't come.  There are days like today when I truly feel like a writer and I pound away at my keyboard for hours.  There are days like several last week when I don't want to put the words on paper because I am experiencing emotions difficult to put into words.  But, regardless of how I'm feeling, I've been committed to write something every day.   The last week of our summer institute we began our writing into the day with a prompt about scars.  I wrote instead about an...

This week we wrapped up our physical time together for our Wyoming Writing Project summer institute.  We were joined this summer by eight gifted teachers as full time participants and several others joining us for tastes of WWP in hopes of joining us full time next year.  I have been thinking about numbers and events in terms of data as we get ready to give updates to stakeholders.  The numbers just don't tell the story. We traveled to Wheatland, Evanston, and Laramie.  In those places we worked with a total of 35 K-12 teachers directly through their attendance at our professional development events.  We had more than 45 join us for community writing marathons.  Here's what those numbers don't tell: Our new Teacher Consultants delivered PD to their colleagues- some for the very first time. These consultants ranged from teachers who recently retired to new teachers finishing their first and third year of teaching. We received feedback like "I grew so ...