The Merry Disorder of Young Consciousness

"...the merry disorder of young consciousness."

—New York Times

The above quotation is a description of a Belgian theater troupe comprised of young adolescents. It’s an apt term for what we are trying to do these days at the North Branch School.

It is particularly apropos because we are attempting to transform ourselves into theater troupe as we write our play. Normally we are autobiographical narrative writers, literary deconstructionists, or astronomical observers, or bread-bakers, or Utopian theorists, or poem-intoners, or geometers, or volcanic geologists.

Now, utilizing the miraculous powers of the merry disorder of young consciousness, we are creating a dramatic and comically serious version of ourselves. I need to say that this is mind-bendingly difficult. As far as the teaching arts go, having a class of students write something together which accurately reflects some important and personal truths, to have them do this in a general state of collaborative joy and assent, to have them say something together and something about each of themselves—that is a feat of teaching that requires singular genius.

When I say genius, I mean more than just originality, creativity, or intelligence. I mean the kind of “genius associated with achievement of insight which has transformational power,” according to Wikipedia, that "fundamentally alters the expectations of its audience. Genius may be generalized, or be particular to a discrete field such as sports, literature, art, or science."

Our work of genius will be a work of art and laughter. There are ten thousand decisions to make, energies to direct, voices to moderate, ideas to bring forth. Our noble intention is first to achieve insight into ourselves, for ourselves: insight about our ways of working, who we have been and who we are becoming. Second, we want to do it well enough that it can fundamentally alter the expectations of the audience in a way that makes the audience have more respect forthe power and abilities of a merry, disordered band of young adolescents.

I am not saying that I am a genius, but I am the animating force. Let us just say that I am the one that pulls the string on the spinning top, and, therefore, the one who releases the initial motion. But the blur of color the top makes, where it goes, the frictions it encounters or avoids, how wildly it spins or wobbles is also as much a function of the mass and make-up of the kids. The top, the class, is its own full spinning and tilting orb throwing off merry disorder like the arms of some wild hormonal nebula of the Green Mountain Galaxy. What we make, then, is an as yet unknowable motion that will track its own path, form its own luminous patterns, something spectacular enough that we will want observe and study it and gaze on it for time to come.

Part of the joy of the play is that the kids know that this is what we are doing, what they are being given to do. Perhaps it is the same glee a small child feels in having a trusted adult toss them up in the air, only to be caught again. They know I am winding them up and letting them go.

They know they are making some kind of cosmic true expression of the dimensions of their minds. That joy is elemental source that keeps them saying, “When are we going to work on the play?!” and “Can we work on the play?!” It is the same as, “Will you toss me up and let me go?”

I want them to feel this feeling and to want to be wild and free and then express that free wildness. It should be obvious, though, that this dynamic is also going to lead us into provocative, difficult, and complex territory. After all, we are dealing with forces of nature, growing beings, chemical reactions, magmatic ideas, identity in formation. Still, I have to say to them: “Say anything.” I say that because I trust that no matter what comes out first, there is always something good behind it. I say this knowing that they will probably say some “wrong” things. We end up with a messy mass of material. Invariably the first part to come out is shallow and comical; next to come is more serious, meditative, philosophical. From our mistakes, miss-sayings or wrong-doings we make sift and adjustments and alterations. The learning happens in the tension between the wild, gay abandon and that focused, technical crafting and final shaping.

Right now all the characters are coming out and being formed, it is crazy and wild and we have to let everything come out. We have to see what we have and what we are and what we are all willing to work with. There are all types of kids who will try or want to do all types of things, try anything, push the proverbial universal envelope. We are "playing,” (as in a play) like little kids playing (in a sandbox) and we will do some things "over the top” and then have to decide how to do it right, like learning to understand the rules, pull back or go further. We all have to trust each other to know that we will make something that is valuable, first to us, and then perhaps to the audience.

Schopenhauer said, “Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.” We are attempting to hit the target only we have seen. That target—that glowing mandala that we hover around or pour ourselves into everyday is a composite of all that we have felt, observed, heard, laughed, talked, cried and written about—finds its apotheosis in the play. Our target, the one we aim to show, the one we aim to hit—a theatrical, dynamic, poetic, comical and visual expression of the year’s collective soul. There are 27 souls involved, so there will be many shots toward the target. Sometimes we will miss, it is always messy and still forming. We have eighty days for it to grow and bloom.

***

NBS Alums Doug Woos, Head lecturer, and assistant Tim Woos, computer operator and astro-photographer, came to give us a talk about astronomy: Doug presented on the concept of time and relative distance in the universe, the gas-make-up of Jupiter, the Greek names of stars, how elements emit light differently, star-life cycles and kinds of stars, the origins of star names (Greek names, COOL; 17^th century European names, LAME); the elements in stars; nebula, galaxies (and whether they “feed” off each other or if they are “hungry," black holes and worm-holes, the construction of telescopes, and much more. Doug reminded us that there are four forces at work in the universe, “Five, if you’re like Tal, and you think love is one of the animating forces.” We were left wondering if the most fascinating part of this is the observable, knowable, measurable stuff, or the philosophical ramifications of the things we don’t know.