Yesterday was momentous—we set a world record of 267 for Score, a travel game played by counting all the yellow vehicles you come across. Every time you see one, you shout “score!” and add a point. Like all games, this one too has a catch. School buses and road construction equipment, which are commonly yellow,…
Whitman for Another Generation
Review: The Tao of Walt Whitman by Connie Shaw and Ike Allen, Sentient, Boulder, 2011 If there is any person who had a life dream and followed through on it, it was Walt Whitman. He set out to write America’s book of poetry—verse for laborer and intellectual alike. His vision was to have poetry be…
Happiness Is
I have discovered the key to happiness. No, it’s not a change in lifestyle or some Zen shift in consciousness. Let’s call it happen-ness—whatever happens makes me happy. The key here is that it happens as opposed to my wanting it to happen or not happen. My refrigerator is a noisy runner, and it used…
Do We Need the Trickster?
Review: Trickster Makes this World: Mischief, Myth, and Heart, by Lewis Hyde, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1998. Many nonfiction books read as though the author had a good, tight essay and for some unfounded reason decided to expand it. Many of our school library’s books have highlighted passages, as though readers were wading…
Love and Illusion
Love is give-and-take, love is putting someone else ahead of yourself, love has the power to change your life. Is this how you view love, and is this what you practice in your loving relationship? It was for me at one time, and it just about killed me. Let’s take an objective look at the…
Beauty Is
I just read about a man who had a flower garden that he continually improved by pulling out the plain-looking specimens and throwing them in the garbage. One day while he was out walking, he passed by a flower garden more beautiful than his. Wracked with jealousy, he asked the gardener where she got her…
Creativity and the Critical Process
Instead of reading other peoples’ material to improve your writing skills, I suggest reading your readers. If you write to be read, who could be better qualified than your audience to guide your evolution as a writer? Denis Dutton, professor of philosophy at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand and author of The Art Instinct:…
An Extraordinary Story Collection
The Teaching Drum Outdoor School library holds a collection of stories from the world’s indigenous cultures that rivals those of some universities. Each book has merit or it wouldn’t be there. At the same time, a few books stand out for their extraordinary contributions to our understanding of the central role stories play in the lives of indigenous…
The Hunt Comes Home
While putting the finishing touches on a collection of tracking stories, I came to realize that not all of them have happy endings—at least in the eyes of some. When a trail leads to a kill site, the sign often tells me a story laden with pain and fear. And the bloody scene does not…
What Makes a Good Story?
Captivating stories are generally centered around fools on quests for wisdom. These stories take their readers on the quest rather than imparting the wisdom the fools might eventually gain. In many good stories, the fools never become enlightened. And if they do, it is not until the very end, almost as an afterthought. Good stories…