We climb to hopes
Of such seeing up the leaf-shuttered escarpments,
Blindered by green, under a green-grained sky
Into the blue.
—Sylvia Plath
Monday
Claire talked about when she was with her friend who works at the gallery who she has known for a really long time. She had been thinking about how this person was kind of like her older sister.
At Patrick’s soccer practice there was one kid who was criticizing everyone when they made mistakes, and he realized that, even when we are running around and yelling, we are pretty mature.
Simon was at the perspective students meeting and saw the way Tal, Eric and Rose were talking about the school and realized how much they do for us and the school.
Eric was also at the perspective students meeting and heard Simon and Rowan talk about their experience at North Branch, and liked that they could talk about what we do there so clearly.
Rose saw that instead of getting the play organized Friday afternoon while Tal was there we decided to do it Monday on our own and she thought it was cool we that we did that.
Anneke watched a movie about a lady who stalked her ex-husband and was then sent to an insane asylum. While the lady was in the asylum a man came up to her and told her that she shouldn’t be wasting her time in that place, she should go somewhere else and do something. This made Anneke think about how we have so much at school, but the only place its truly worth something is outside the school.
Finn read “Moving Forward,” by Rilke:
The deep parts of my life pour onward,
as if the river shores were opening out.
It seems that things are more like me now,
That I can see farther into paintings.
I feel closer to what language can't reach.
With my senses, as with birds, I climb
into the windy heaven, out of the oak,
in the ponds broken off from the sky
my falling sinks, as if standing on fishes.
Tuesday
Tal came back and was asking about how class had been in the 20 below weather the day before. Some people started shouting out and arguing over the inside and outside temperatures of the snow shelter, which Tal interested in for about three seconds until someone said, “I didn’t go out.” This shocked Tal because he thought that we should be true Vermonters, and real persons, and risk the cold. He said that if there is ever a point in your life where you could choose discomfort over boring and the same you should take discomfort, unless it will kill you. He said that the only time you can grow is when you are uncomfortable, when there is tension. He said that he tries to create tension at school so we can be at a place where “something happens.” Then he told us that people in Atlanta close school when it gets down to seven degrees, and then talked about Paideia baseball, and when they posed in the snow pretending to play baseball, and then a newsletter article was written about the hard-coreness of Paideia’s baseball team.
Calder said that while he was at soccer practice Hugh said that the problem with adolescents is that we can’t change our decisions once there made. Calder had been thinking about this and realized it was true--when he was opening the dishwasher and it was stuck he repeatedly yanked it but it didn’t open. Instead of looking to see what was wrong, he kept pulling on the dishwasher until it opened, which took a very long time and was probably the least efficient way to do it.
Tal then talked for several minutes about the contents of cabinets in kitchens, and how it was always the cheese-grater that jams up the drawers. After considering this fact for some times, he has decided that it is easier to keep the cheese grater in a cabinet.
Eric said it was very liberating to come to a new house and leave all of his junk behind.
Claire talked about two police officers who were shot while searching a man. She was thinking about how easy it is for people to get defensive.
Simon read "Ionic" by Catullus
That we've broken their statues,
that we've driven them out of their temples,
doesn't mean at all that the gods are dead.
O land of Ionia, they're still in love with you,
their souls still keep your memory.
When an August dawn wakes over you,
your atmosphere is potent with their life,
and sometimes a young ethereal figure
indistinct, in rapid flight,
wings across your hills.
Wednesday
Calder was looking at the corrections on his story that were done by his dad and his brother. He noticed that they were similar, so therefore Henry and Tal are similar.
The night before many North Branch students had watched the State of the Union address, proving our knowledge and brilliance compared to many other adolescents, who spend too much time listening to “Grenade” by Bruno Mars.
Jesse was watching the State of the Union address and kept hearing Obama say that he wants America to be great, but she was thinking that the ultimate goal should be for the world to be great, but for the world to be great we should stop trying to be better than everybody else.
Claire had a dream about Martin Luther King dream coming out of Obama’s mouth, and said that although Obama is not as great as Martin Luther King, he’s the best we’ve got, and he could make things great.
Kiley was thinking about how lucky we are to have peaceful, regular elections, because in some places things never change, except for when there is violence.
Anna heard Obama say that we have to move forward, and realized that we are always trying to move forward at school, so we are a kind of mini-world.
Tal said that he has figured out Obama’s strengths and weaknesses, and then said that the work of the president is to get people together, which is a very difficult thing. He said it was hard enough to bring our school together and move all of us together to a good place, but imagine it when you are trying to move 300 million people to one place together.
Jesse’s brother told her a story about machine gunners on the White House, and she said that even though we are farther along than some countries, but we are not perfect.
Simon was thinking about the Tucson shootings and how the lady who got shot has come to a stable condition, and was thinking about how strong you would have to be to pull through something like that.
Rose said she was very proud of the math nerds, or “mathletes” as they are sometimes referred to for wanting to go to the competition that would happen that afternoon, then we talked about how strange it is that so much is spent at the football program at some schools, while the people who are there to learn, which is, last time I checked the reason for college, get ignored.
Evan had a basketball game against a team that always beats them, and after three minutes they were down 14-0, but then they came back and won, and that made Evan feel really good.
Claire read "It was a Quiet Seeming Day" by Emily Dickinson.
It was a quiet seeming Day —
There was no harm in earth or sky —
Till with the closing sun
There strayed an accidental Red
A Strolling Hue, one would have said
To westward of the Town —
But when the Earth began to jar
And Houses vanished with a roar
And Human Nature hid
We comprehended by the Awe
As those that Dissolution saw
The Poppy in the Cloud
Thursday
Rose said that the math team had gone down to Gailer, and she noticed that the NBS kids were the weirdest and wildest, but they were also the most enthusiastic and excited.
Anneke was reading her lit and then her mom came and talked to her about baby pictures of Anneke that were on facebook. After seeing these Anneke felt that life goes too fast and you only get so much time. Then Tal interjected and said that thinking about how much time you have left can be sad, it is a good thing to think about because it will make you do more with the time you do have. He talked about “memento mori” paintings and how the purpose of those, like “carpe diem” poems, is to remind us that time and life is precious, that we need to be aware of the closeness of the end so we take care of the time we have. “Y’all,” he said, “it is dark, spark, then dark, so it is good, Anneke, be aware of that. If you are always aware, you can make each day or moment meaningful.”
Simon was talking to Claire during study and had a good time doing that.
Tal said that the afternoon before Doon saw him, and then just came and hugged him, maybe because, Tal thought, Tal appeared so haggard. Tal is not really the huggy type, but he thought that it was amazing that Doon did that even though he doesn’t know Doon that well. He said Doon crossed a lot of time and space and unfamiliarity to throw himself into that hug. He also said that Doon is a really good hugger, and then he gave Tal a quick shoulder rub, it made Tal feel better.
Luke watched a movie about two friends on the run from the law, “The Outsiders.” One of the friends quoted Robert Frost’s poem Nothing Gold can Stay. The other friend thought about the poem, and thought that it meant that you are golden when you are a kid, but you can’t stay a kid forever. Then he died saving kids because they were more golden than him. Luke was thinking about how he is golden right now, but he won’t be forever. Tal said: the goal of life is to try to stay golden.
Friday
Tal said various variations on bro, as he was inspired by Luke, and said that at NBS he (Tal) was the “broffesor”.
Everyone spoke about something that was copied off of cowgirlslang.com, which we shall not expel to the world as it was kind of inappropriate and Tal does not wan to bring shame and scorn raining down upon us.
Jesse came home to an empty house and she was scared so she called Anneke and went to her house. She said that she feels safe with Anneke.
Tal said that he was having a good teacher/student relationship with Jesse and she was having good thoughts and he wa sin a good “conversation” with her. Tal explained how he sometimes teases us to get out something more, but it is a way to find some cracks and to get us in a conversation with him, and he is always trying to lure us into conversations, like a bullfighter; or like a fisherman, offering a tasty looking lure to big “Catty-Wampuses.” (Extra credit: find the etymology and meaning of “catty-wampus.”)
Fairchild, A.K.A. Morgan, spoke about her mom sewing curtains for her room. Morgan always told her they were nice, and she said she felt good that her mom was doing something that she cared about, that was creative.
Rio started to talk, saying “This person like…” After the word “like” Tal interrupted and told him to start over. Rio then talked about how there are some things that are important and some are not.
Simon said that the day before he was reading about flying squirrels. He enjoyed this and thought that flying squirrels are almost perfect machines.
Tal said that ducks are cool too.
Yared said that he can fly, stating “I can fly in my dreams. I am the black superman. Burger King.”
We all laughed about this for a while.
Anna told of a body builder and how he trained people, but the people didn’t like him because he was better than them.
Tal told of the amazingly difficult training regimen that He, Calder and Ollie were undergoing at Synergy Football club. A brutal physical training, modeled on a Bolivian Football Club called Tahuichi, which emphasizes having a rock solid physical and mental foundation before anything else.
Sophie went in to do her solo skating routine and said that she wants to be able to do things herself. She said she gets up at 5 am every morning to train. Tal said this is the kind of discipline, which, practiced over time, makes someone or something great.
Eric said that if you are reading the science and you are able to relate it to other things than you are doing it right.
Oliver read “Above the Oxbow” by Sylvia Plath
Here in this valley of discrete academies
We have not mountains, but mounts, truncated hillocks
To the Adirondacks, to northern Monadnock,
Themselves mere rocky hillocks to an Everest.
Still, they're out best mustering of height: by
Comparison with the sunnken silver-grizzled
Back of the Connecticut, the river-level
Flats of Hadley farms, they're lofty enough
Elevations to be called something more than hills.
Green, wholly green, they stand their knobby spine
Against our sky: they are what we look southward to
Up Pleasant Street at Main. Poising their shapes
Between the snuff and red tar-paper apartments,
They mound a summer coolness in our view.
To people who live in the bottom of valleys
A rise in the landscape, hummock or hogback, looks
To be meant for climbing. A peculiar logic
In going up for the coming down if the post
We start at's the same post we finish by,
But it's the clear conversion at the top can hold
Us to the oblique road, in spite of a fitful
Wish for even ground, and it's the last cliff
Ledge will dislodge out cramped concept of space, unwall
Horizons beyond vision, spill vision
After the horizons, stretching the narrowed eye
To full capacity. We climb to hopes
Of such seeing up the leaf-shuttered escarpments,
Blindered by green, under a green-grained sky
Into the blue. Tops define themselves as places
Where nothing higher's to be looked to. Downward looks
Follow the black arrow-backs of swifts on their track
Of the air eddies' loop and arc though air's at rest
To us, since we see no leaf edge stir high
Here on a mount overlaid with leaves. The paint-peeled
Hundred-year-old hotel sustains its ramshackle
Four-way veranda, view-keeping above
The fallen timbers of its once remarkable
Funicular railway, witness to gone
Time, and to graces gone with the time. A state view-
Keeper collects half-dollars for the slopes
Of state scenery, sells soda, shows off viewpoints.
A ruffy skylight oaints the gray oxbow
And paints the river's pale circumfluent stillness.
As roses broach their carmine in a mirror. Flux
Of the desultory currents --- all that unique
Stripple of shifting wave-tips is ironed out, lost
In the simplified orderings of sky-
Lorded perspectives. Maplike, the far fields are ruled
By correct green lines and no seedy free-for-all
Of asparagus heads. Cars run their suave
Colored beads on the strung roads, and the people stroll
Straightforwardly across the springing green.
All's peace and discipline down there. Till lately we
Lived under the shadow of hot rooftops
And never saw how coolly we might move. For once
A high hush quietens the crickets' cry.
Tal said this was his favorite Sylvia Plath poem, and she was bringing the good stuff.
