NBS Covenant

NBS Covenant

We should always: be striving for good/better in concert with others, even if that involves discomfort; believe that organization and belief can bring something unpredictable and great about; be doing concentrated and focused work towards a purpose as great as ourselves.

NBS runs smoothly when everyone is happy with themselves. We stipulate to this statement from all evidence hereby seen, felt, and experienced at the North Branch School. We run smoothly when we feel comfortable to cry and when we feel like we can help each other with our problems. When we can function completely independently then we will run smoothly. To run smoothly we at North Branch must accept everything, have patience, be generous, want to give their all and dedicate themselves, and try to put as much love as we can into everything we do.

We must be motivated by our wanting to be and do good, be confident in ourselves and our work, be generous and give to ourselves and others, and overall, learn to love, ourselves, our work, and others. We should all try to be like a family. We will always love, trust, and be honest with each other, like a family would be. We should all be committed to the whole, and do our part, to the best of our ability, to make the whole (which is that we all want to be safe and learn and grow) the best it can be;

That we try to see everyone as a whole being, and not block out their friendship or trust by judging, or discriminating on the basis of not letting the person speak up for themselves, or only looking at one part of a situation. We need to do things more acutely and we need to be fiercer in what we do, and clean better with more vigor;

To do things with a whole heart and find the source of our most complicated feelings; By knowing how we act and feel in curtain situations, it will help prevent problems. To respect each other in all situations, learn to forgive, and to do everything to the greatest of our ability, in order to demonstrate greatness.

Things in school can connect to things in our lives. All students of the North Branch School should and could be more respectful, honest and trust worthy. It is stipulated that we will learn important things and be smarter than the Average Joe; be willing to sacrifice personal wants for the common good; respect/honor each other.

We all need to have a goal that is similar to everyone else. The importance of speaking directly forms our own truth and that of whomever we are speaking to. To run smoothly we need constant respect in a way that doesn’t inflict too much upon another's actions. We need a kind of reckless mastery that lets us act in a way that is uninhabited but also thoughtful enough that in our chaos and recklessness we aren’t harming anything.

We need to act in such a way that lets us create something beautiful out of the mess without breaking things unnecessarily along the way. All of the community sweeping devices shall hereby remain intact and shall not be broken in any way, shape or form. Also, community owned devices shall be kept intact and not broken into little peaces. We shall be respectful of the older passengers or persons in the school, most specifically Tal, Eric and Rose.

NBS needs to be able to communicate, not only as a school, but individually. We must be able to separate from our safe places so we all will be able to connect to all. We stipulate that we will all connect with one another without hesitancy or fear. We will leave our safe places and join/connect with each other. But we will not avoid our safe places; we will just reach out to others.

We need to care about what we are doing. From small things like cleaning to big things like our stories. To be able to give up something we have personally and help the entire school. Trust each other, enough to have confidence to say anything troubling us; to love each memory and experience in our lives, but not trying to live only in that memory all the time; to be able to write well and to be able to put our feelings down on paper; to be able to find something inside that goes deeper then everyday life.

We need to not hurt each other, not pick fights with each other over small things. We have to see the bigger picture. See what our actions do to each other. We need to take what we learn every day with us and ponder on it for a while. We will not battle of push aside each other's ideas, requests, and thoughts.

At NBS there will be equally distributed responsibilities in technical terms, and faith in self discipline for the abstract ones. We will, in the name of the higher law, hereunto find the time and space to solve social and operational conflicts among the members. We, the aforesaid owners and contributors in eternal equilibrium will swear to this document, this song of ourselves. We shall hereby put the hunger of our souls above that of our minds. Everyone shall listen and respect and experience the awareness that these people have knowledge that we need.

However there shall be no forced agreement. Hear unto we shall be in the unending ever evolving and dedicated quest for knowledge. We need to find, search for, and always attempt to expand our understanding of past present and future. We need to accept all ideas, all people, each give everything to our work, so that we can be true before each other. We need to accept everything to keep things in balance.

There are three rules that Mary Oliver spoke of: that one needs to learn to love, to know love in one's heart, and when the time comes, to let it go. We need to meet on the field Rumi spoke of, we need to breathe poetry as air, and learn not to fear what the sleeper dreams. We need to use these covenants not just in one place but all places, so we may all know each other as we know ourselves.

Our Way of Entering Fire

Last Week: Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday By Lydia; Tuesday by Hannah

Monday:

It was the first day back since the ninth grade hike, so naturally all of the ninth graders were talking about it. When I walked into the big room that morning the room was filled with the jabber of happy little students. The bell rang and we all settled down. Luke talked about being with his brother, not fighting, just playing games. We reminisced on how tough Bryn was during the Hike. Never once did she complain about her belly hurting. Even when we asked her, she would just say that it hurt. Nothing more, nothing less.

“She was in pain most or all the time, and unlike some of us, complaining about our hurting hips, or feet, she was silent,” said Tal.

“It’s an awesome experience after three years to go hiking in the woods,” said Henry.

We talked about what it was like when the ninth graders were not at school, and it was just the 70s and 80s.

“ The first day it was controlled, the second day reality sank in more. The second day we were not as excited to do the things that we were doing,” said Rider.

“ I felt like I was not an 80 yet, but I was not a sevie anymore. I am beyond what I started out as,” said Simon.

We talked about some of the problems that happened when the ninth graders were away. One of the groups was fighting about a name, and about who got to model for there group. How some people didn’t really listen to others when they talked about what the name for their group would be. We talked about you can’t always be the leader. Sometimes you have to step aside and let someone else’s ideas be heard.

“ It feels like we made you feel really small by not listening,” said Rider.

“ But, like umm,” offered Claire.

“ An excellent comment, Claire,” said Tal.

“ There is no future in modeling, but there is a future in saying, ‘Okay you go, you can be the leader,” said Tal.

Aylee read the poem “Sunrise” By Mary Oliver, here it is:

You can die for it, an idea,

or the world. People

have done so,

brilliantly,

letting

their small bodies be bound

to the stake,

creating

an unforgettable

fury of light. But

this morning,

climbing the familiar hills

in the familiar

fabric of dawn, I thought

of China,

and India

and Europe, and I thought

how the sun

blazes

for everyone just

so joyfully

as it rises

under the lashes

of my own eyes, and I thought

I am so many!

What is my name?

What is the name

of the deep breath I would take

over and over

for all of us? Call it

whatever you want, it is

happiness, it is another one

of the ways to enter

Fire.

Tuesday, by Hannah

It was morning meeting, we all sat in the big room, notebooks and lunch boxes had already been strewn across the table. “Does anybody have anything?” boomed the headmaster, Tal, over everyone’s chitter-chatting. He called on Reed. Reed told us that he had been reading The Catcher in the Rye for lit and he had noticed Holden Caulfield not knowing how to say goodbye to his prep school, and he was thinking about how to say goodbye to North Branch, and that he didn’t know how to say goodbye to North Branch. Next Tal called on Nathan. Nate talked about his brother’s tennis match over the weekend that he had lost, he told us the scores, but it all summed up to: Nathan was going to miss his brother next year when he left for college. Miles told us that his dad had taken him to an art museum and had seen lots of cool things and he felt bad when he didn’t leave a note in the comment book. Tal asked him if there was any Warhol. Miles said some, and Tal asked Cassie if she had the flyer for the art show hanging on her fridge. Cassie looked at him dully, and said she didn’t in a somewhat confused tone. Rider mentioned something (not as a morning meeting comment) about how NBS Alumni, Fielding Jenks wrote in some comment book for something ‘great stay, women were great’ and his brother, Penn wrote (pretending to be Fielding’s wife) ‘great stay but these girls need to have a talk with their fathers.’ I’m not really sure what he was talking about, but it happened.

“Hen, did you do the poem sign ups?” Tal asked his first born son.

“Yep, I did ‘em yesterday,” Henry said, leaning back in his wooden chair-desk.

“Alright, who’s signed up for today?” Tal asked. It was Claire. She didn’t have a poem. But quickly Anneke jumped to her rescue and pulled out “Brown and Agile Child” by Pablo Neruda. Claire read it and meeting was concluded – or so we thought. While Miles and the other techies were setting up the projector Tal decided to teach us a little bit about the upcoming 2010 World Cup Football Tournament in South Africa.

“The World Cup is to the Super Bowl as a billboard is to a postage stamp,” he explained. He went on about the scoring and the teams, and Calder and Yared chipped in occasionally.

Finally, after much grief with the projector, Aylee begun her project on Oneida, which was a commune founded 150 years ago in Oneida, NY, by a guy named John Humphrey Noyes. He was a utopian socialist who lived from 1811-1886. Aylee told us that JFK’s assassin had once joined the Oneida community previous to his murdering of Kennedy, and the lifestyles of Oneida had made him a little bit crazy. In Oneida they believed that no matter what they did, they could not sin. The community reached their peak of 306 members in 1878. So if you can imagine 306 people running around thinking that they can’t do wrong, you’ve got yourself a little bit of a problem, or at least nothing even remotely under control. Oneida was ranked the 19th century’s most successful utopian project though. One thing that the people of Oneida would do was they would pick someone and tell them all of the flaws in their character to “make them better”. For her activity Aylee told us we were going to do that as well. We had volunteers; Claire and about seven boys. We chose Reed Messner to go first and we soon discovered that things that could be categorized as flaws could instantly be turned into good qualities. Tal gave us the statistics; possibly, he said, about 75% of our character and personality is genetic (we have no control over it—we are what we are) and 25% we can change sort of depending on what we do and the decisions we make (a lot of which may be determined by our genetics). We tried again to find character flaws in Claire and maybe somebody else but gave up quickly as it was obvious the “flaws” were really parts of her that were growing and changing and mostly wonderful.

Next, without a break Miles presented Part Three of his project on Animal Utopias and Societies. Part One had been on bees, Part Two had been on wolves, and now Part Three was on Meerkats, a little bit on elephants, a little bit on killer whales, and a little bit on penguins. He started off right away by telling us Meerkats are not cats. They are technically part of the mongoose family. The English translation of Meerkat is ‘marsh cat’, but they live in the desert, so, he told us, the person who named them was an idiot. Actually, the Kalahari Desert, in Africa is the only place in the world that Meerkats, but don’t worry; they’re not endangered. Each “gang” of Meerkats has a territory of about 1-3 miles, with anywhere from 6-15 burrows in it and they switch burrows every 2 weeks because as you can imagine, they get pretty grimy after a while, and their burrows are 6-8 feet underground. He said that gangs will fight over territory sometimes and when they fight they puff up their fur to look bigger and jump up and down to appear scary. He told us that Meerkats are actually pretty evolved and they basically have a language because they can make up to 20 sounds and 4 different syllables. We were all kind of shocked when he informed us that that alpha female will eat any cubs pups that are born if they’re not her own. Oliver related that this was similar to his project, which had been on Eugenics. We watched a video about Meerkats, which to most of us, or, most of the boys, was more funny than informal, mainly because it involved a renegade meerkat who was trying to get He told us a little bit about elephants, one thing that I already knew was that elephants mourn, and I read somewhere that elephants are the only animal aside from humans that cry during and after death of a group member. Then he talked a little bit about Killer Whales; they live in pods, and Tal played us a video he found of the noises they make. It was almost like singing. For Penguins he told us they are the most social bird. While looking at some of the pictures of the penguins, people shouted about the movies, Happy Feet, and March of the Penguins. At the end he remembered Meer Kats don’t need to drink water because there’s enough water in the things that they eat that they can get by.

We talked a little about it afterwards.

“…learning from other things can better ourselves…” said Nate.

“…we’re dependant on learning. It’s unfair that they have knowledge already, we should have more instinctual stuff…” Rider said.

“…Meer Kats, bees and other animals are born to do certain roles in their societies, we’re not…” Yared said.

“…we’re more selfish…” Simon added.

We have interests we can’t control; we have ranges of what we choose.

“You guys are all like the little Meer Kats on the first day of school; all looking around for potential threats,” Tal said, swerving his head around, as if surveying for predators.

It was break. Nate and Reed Me. went out onto the patio and did cool jumps and tricks with their skateboards. And the seventh and eighth graders all scattered into little groups to practice a couple more times before lunch the songs that they had written about the ninth graders in their specific group for science. I called Lydia, who was out sick to ask her why she was not in school. Her nose was all stuffed and she replied, wheezing something that sounded a little more like “I’b sig” than “I’m sick” and I put her on speaker phone so that Tal and Henry could also laugh at her pathetic speech. I hung up and the 8thand 9th graders went into the big room for lit and the sevies went to Rose for math.

Next I went to science and then it was lunch. We frolicked for a little while but were then called into the Big Room to hear the songs that the sevies and eighties had practiced. The first group: Calder, Evan, Rio, Sophie, and Luke sang about Reed Messner and Cassie, a song they had written to the tune of Redemption Song, which we had sang during intermission of the play this year. The second group: Miles, Anna, Reed Martin, and Jesse had written a rap song about Henry, Isabel and Edgar. Miles made the beats while the girls, sunglasses, hoods, puckered lips and all, rapped about the three ninth graders. The third group: Simon, Anneke, Sarah, Kiley, and Yared, sang to the tune of Mrs. Robinson about Bryn and Nathan. The third group: Ollie, Aylee, Claire and Rider sung about me (Hannah) and Lydia to the tune of You Belong With Me by Taylor Swift. Before they began Rider made the commonly known announcement that he loves Taylor Swift and that she will be his girlfriend very soon. Overall there was much laughter and applause. Rose told us later during math class that she was “blubbering” during the songs because it dawned on her that the ninth graders would soon be leaving and how much she would miss us all.

Soon after that the day was over and we all ran around doing our jobs and gabbing and singing about who knows what. Reed and Nate were back on the patio with their skateboards, Anna and Kiley were running around with their C.U.C. clipboards checking people off for doing their jobs and in the end I think it was a good day at Ye Ole North Branch School.

Wednesday:

On Wednesday, Tal once again brought up our summer homework assignments. He had previously sent out an email with links to various videos about the World Cup, which is going to be held in South Africa this year. Our assignment is to watch the World Cup games, at least one of them, if not all of them. The first match of the US national team, against England, is taking place the same day of the Epigenesis party. Tal so kindly stated that none of us were to show up the Epigenesis party until the match was over.

Rider talked about how after he had watched the previews for the World cup, he watched a preview for the Olympics. About how a guy had been running the two hundred meter dash, fell and broke his leg. His dad came down from the stands and helped him get across the finish line.

“ It really puts winning in perspective,” said rider. “Because he did win in a way, it is almost more of a win for the man who broke his leg, than for the man who really won the race.”

Anneke talked about the show at the MOMA she saw, by Marina Abramovic. The show was that Marina would sit in a red dress, at a table and wait for someone to sit down in front of her, they would just look at each other. Even though there were no words said, it was as though there was some kind of connection, some conversation going on between the two of them. A silent connection.

The Poem read was “To The Harbor Master,” By Frank O’Hara.

I wanted to be sure to reach you;

though my ship was on the way it got caught

in some moorings. I am always tying up

and then deciding to depart. In storms and

at sunset, with the metallic coils of the tide

around my fathomless arms, I am unable

to understand the forms of my vanity

or I am hard alee with my Polish rudder

in my hand and the sun sinking. To

you I offer my hull and the tattered cordage

of my will. The terrible channels where

the wind drives me against the brown lips

of the reeds are not all behind me. Yet

I trust the sanity of my vessel; and

if it sinks, it may well be in answer

to the reasoning of the eternal voices,

the waves which have kept me from reaching you.

In science class that day we were informed that we would be doing Yoga. We all went down to the basement, got out the purple yoga mats, and did some yoga. Sarah taught the first bit of the class. The boys where yelling in pain, saying how they couldn’t do it. How they where falling over. Then when Sarah’s mom Ginger arrived to teach the remainder of the class, all of the boys shut up, and it was practically silent until the end of the class.

Thursday:

On Thursday morning Isabel informed us that she had met with some of her future teachers. Tal was sad to find out that none of these future teachers spit, swore, drooled, or spilled water all over themselves.

We talked about how Kiley has already started researching for her project next year. About how some people see her as just the smart kid. It makes it hard to see past the smartness when that is all people really see. Once we get in the pattern of “Oh, Kiley, she is the smart one,” it is hard to make people see in a new way.

We talked about how when you are not doing very well at NBS, when you are drifting away from your friend, when you are out of the heart of what happens at NBS, you drift away from the Big Room table. It just happened that Rider was sitting in the far corner of the room when Tal said this.

“Rider!” Some of the class shouted.

“You know what,” Rider said as he picked up his chair and moved it right behind Hannah, who was sitting right up to the table. Tal and Rider then proceeded to have what seemed like a 10 second staring contest, in which neither of them won.

Tal told us how surprised he was to find that when he opened his computer he found a big-eyed fuzzy white kitten staring back at him. OBEY THE KITTY!! Miles had changed his computer background from a meaningful picture of the “Pieta” by Michelangelo to photo of a fuzzy kitten named Utopia.

Anneke talked about how lacrosse practice felt weird without her friend Eklutna there.

“ Even though we don’t see each other very much anymore it feels weird when she is not there with me,” said Anneke.

Off of Anneke’s comment, Tal went on to question her ability to play lacrosse. All he seemed to care about was whether or not Anneke was the best on her team, if she kicked people’s butts, and if she hit people with the lacrosse stick like Calder used to hit him. Jesse confirmed that she is really good and really tough.

Aylee read Part of Walt Whitman's song of myself. Unfortunately I was unable to obtain the section she read.

In the afternoon we talked about Yared thinking he was dumb. Thinking he is bad at everything. When really he is not. When you say you are dumb, or bad at something, it cuts out the possibility of growing, or making yourself get better at that thing. It makes you close-minded to the possibility of growing.

“When you say you are dumb it cripples you, you have already given up,” said Tal. “You want to look at the whole, but he honest about what you see,”

Tal then proceeded to prove to the class and Yared that he (Yared) was smart by reading the class Yared’s lit response. Tal Read Simon’s Story about not being able to write very well, not being able to put his all into his writing. Here are some of the responses.

“ You showed your thoughts through your scenes, it’s so direct, you taught me something through it,” said Bryn.

“ He can look at himself so clearly and there is nothing that conflicts his view,” said Rider.

Friday:

During meeting, Claire talked about how she was at a dinner with her mom for all of the Artists showing in her mom’s gallery. Somehow the topic of Marina Abramovic’s art was brought up. One of the artists was against Marina’s art, but Claire really made her see what the meaning behind the art really was. It is interesting, how sometimes people get so caught up on what the surface of something looks like, what their first impression is, that they are unable to see the truth behind things, unable to see what they really mean. Claire made the artist see beyond her initial impression to something that went deeper, and about how art that is not pretty or is “confrontational” is still art, because it makes you think. Claire sounded like a scholar and philosopher, which she is.

Hannah talked about how she was mad most of the day before, and broke down twice. At lunch when she was outside alone on the picnic tables,

“ Well, I had been mad at Lydia for no reason really, and then Yared came out and sat with me trying to make me feel better until class. And then later that night after I got home from soccer practice he called to see if I was feeling any better. I already was feeling better because soccer was fun, but it was really nice of him to call,” said Hannah.

After meeting we all went out to the labyrinth and weeded in silence for about 15 minutes. By the end, there were no weeds left in the sand, and the whole thing had been raked. After we were finished weeding it all, we walked it, also in silence. I, among many, had taken off my shoes to walk it. The sand was not warm yet because it was still early in the day, but it still felt nice between my toes. We all walked in a huge line, following the path that lay ahead of us. The path that took us so close to the center, and then so far out again, until finally we reached the maple tree at the center.

After we finished the labyrinth, we got divided up into groups to finish the various projects we had been trying to finish since the beginning of the year. Some people worked on the bread oven roof. Some worked on our newly created garden. And all of us ninth graders worked on the sun dial we are creating.

In the afternoon, Tal read Kiley’s story about her dream to become a great writer when she was little, and how that dream faded away, until she came to NBS, where it wa s harder, and where she learned how to put all of herself into her story.

“She had to find out that she had to move on from writing a 45 chapter story with 10s of words about mozart to being able to move on and learn the next step. She was in a little world, she had small knowledge and everything seemed easy. Then she came into the big world and everything was harder, said Evan.

Rio did his project on Intentional Communities. He studied the Ten Stones, Blue Moon Cooperative, Hippie Haven, Grigori, and Burlington Co-housing East Village. The main topic of the project was a small group of people that came together, to form a small place to live. A place where if you put something good in, you get something good out, and about how this is done by usually by using “consensus.” At the end of his project, he had us decide by consensus about where our brooms would be stored. We all had to agree to one place. We ended up arguing about it for around 20 minutes, and found we could not all come to consensus, so the brooms will stay where they are. Then he had us come to consensus on whether or not we could follow the covenant that Anneke wrote up from her Shaker project. We did come to consensus on that topic, agreeing that we would try to do it for the rest of the year.

(NBS 2009-10 Covenant to come.)

I had a lot of fun writing this, and taking notes for it all through the week. I hope you enjoyed reading it.

Still and Still Moving

Monday, By Edgar

The bell was rung and everyone gathered around the big room table. In the beginning of morning meeting Sarah raised her hand and then talked about how she had a sleepover with her fellow eighty girls. A week before she had a story read about how she couldn’t understand two of her classmates whom she was friends with, and in one of the scenes she wrote she was at a sleepover and wasn’t feeling happy with her friends. Now she is talking about how she had a great time and how she was dressed up and how they all gave each other “makeovers”. Sarah explained how she felt comfortable and how she is more understanding then she used to be. Others felt like Sarah was more open, but still was herself.

Claire talked about how she too had a sleepover at the Martins, Bryn and Reed’s house. She talked about watching “The Sound of Music” and how Bryn was joyful and enthusiastic.

Jessie went to Connecticut with her father and learned about Lyme disease at a twelve-hour meeting/conference. She didn’t feel bored the entire time and came back with new knowledge she had never heard about. While she was there she bonded with her father and had a great time. During the meeting/conference she listened to an older man be accused of treating his patients wrong when he was just trying to do the right thing. Jessie went into detail about how she felt bad for the man and saw how he was treating his patients with care and respect.

Simon talked about how he was feeling overwhelmed about a science project and decided to play the piano. He claimed he wasn’t playing it correctly but Claire thought otherwise. When Claire walked in she started telling Simon that the music was great and how she thought that it was cool that he was playing at school. Simon then told the school, that this made him feel happy and closer to Claire.

Anneke found out that there were twenty days left at school and felt sad that the ninth graders were leaving. And he wanted to explain how she would miss us. She then explained how she wasn’t sure if she was ready to become a ninth grader,

“It will be weird not having anyone ahead of us,” she said.

Yared then pulled out his poem and read it, and he said that it was for the ninth graders. The poem was about how the ninth graders are leaving and how each year when a ninth grader leaves, he or she is replaced. In the poem it explained how a tree falls and its years of life fall when it falls, but each tree stump has another tree grow inside of it. This is the point of leaving. We, the ninth graders, pass on our knowledge to the seventh and eighth graders before we go and they continue the cycle, and that is how life and the school works.

The rest of the school day: in science class we started to learn about the birds and the bees. Eric decided to finally teach us about the human body. So after many years of waiting Eric decided to stay true to his word. Eric chose to teach us through a fun learning-filled way. We are going to write songs, or create skits about the body. Some groups decided to create skits of a science class with a boring nasal teacher telling them about the body and having some kids crack jokes about this while the teacher is talking. While some decided to create and sing a song about parents telling their kid or kids about life. Over the course of these classes there was lots of laughter and excitement but there was also confusion and respect.

“WE have to be respectful, but we also need to have open humor about it, we’re 12-15 year olds!” said Henry Birdsey

In All Tal class Tal asked if people were going to step it up and become ninth and eighth graders while the current ninth graders are on the hike. Rider talked about how Tal and Rider talked about Mother’s day. He mentioned how he gave is mom a card with a horse on it; and how inside he wrote about Asher Lev. He connected his mom to Asher’s mom. He saw how Asher’s mom is trying to help Asher have something concrete. Rider explained why he made the card; he said it was because he sees his mother creating something concrete for his family and he was/is grateful. Tal asked what he was trying to say. Rider replied, "I want her to know I love her."

“Now did Rider step it up just now,” Tal asked.

“Yes,” everyone replied. Now we all just have to do so.

“It’s a chance to decide if you are going to be productive next year,” someone said.

Tal then read Anna’s story about whom she liked and how she was afraid to express her feelings but she did. She was very brave doing so. She showed something the school didn’t know about her. She liked a boy in the school; she showed it at times and was shy when near him. Se wanted to be Luna Lovegood, a character from Harry Potter, someone who was outrageous and showed her feelings to everyone. Her story was about how she left the shy girl behind and became who she really wanted to be. Anna accomplished something great. She was scared to tell him her feelings and knew that he liked someone else. She had many opportunities and she didn’t use them, she realized this and kept on telling herself that she would. And eventually she did. She overcame something hard and she did the right thing. She expressed her love.

TUESDAY, by Edgar

Anna started morning meeting by talking about how she chatted with Hannah, and she thanked Hannah for telling her her (anna’s) story was good. Hannah told Anna that she wants to be better friends and get to know Anna more.

Tal somehow got into a rant about putting knowledge into the bank, in a metaphorical sense. Tal asked if we were putting everything into the bank or if we were just letting it fly by. To me it seemed as if Tal was asking or doing so to get us prepared for the upcoming weeks for when we will be talking about glass onions. And what is to be happening next year.

Nathan talked about his brother is leaving for college and Johan his friend/ exchange student is going to be leaving. Nathan talked about how this relates to his story and how he will miss his brother and “Brother”, Johan. Tal told Nathan to talk to Lydia about this subject as Lydia has two siblings in college.

I read a poem by Edgar Allen Poe,

Evening Star

'Twas noontide of summer,


And mid-time of night;


And stars, in their orbits,


Shone pale, thro' the light


Of the brighter, cold moon,


'Mid planets her slaves,


Herself in the Heavens,


Her beam on the waves.


I gazed awhile


On her cold smile;


Too cold- too cold for me-


There pass'd, as a shroud,


A fleecy cloud,


And I turned away to thee,


Proud Evening Star,


In thy glory afar,


And dearer thy beam shall be;


For joy to my heart


Is the proud part


Thou bearest in

Heaven at night,


And more I admire


Thy distant fire,


Than that colder, lowly light. 



—Edgar Allan Poe

Hannah presented a great project about Sierra Leone in which I learned a lot about blood diamonds, the Civil War in Sierra Leone, and what it is like for the people to have to have gone through terrible things. Basically, her project was about Dystopia. Hannah asked us what we would choose if we were told we would loose a limb or kill children, women and men by decapitation, without knowing this is what lies ahead. All we know is that we will be joining terrorist like groups. It was scary to think about. But not all hope was lost. Hannah told us about the Sierra Leone football club (Soccer for those American type). The game is like normal soccer but only those with missing legs or arms can play. The game is like normal football, it consists of two teams. All positions are the same as regular football players are missing a leg and use crutches to run while keepers are missing an arm or hand. The game has been a big hope for those who thought they could no longer play after they had lost limbs in the Civil War.

Step-Up Day for the Weekly Email (7^th and eighth graders at school for Wednesday/Thursday

Written by Miles Waldron

Wednesday

Wednesday was the first day that the ninth graders were on their annual hike and the sevies and eighties were left at the school alone with Eric. We all sat up at the table and began morning meeting, Rider took charge and sat in Tal’s chair, squeaking back and forth.

“I was thinking of the ninth graders and felt really happy for them,” someone said.

“I was talking to Rose this morning and she was really nervous but after a while she felt better.”

“Yesterday I was talking to a 5 year old friend of mine about the universe, it was really interesting that I could talk to other people about that kind of thing”

“Yesterday I had a good time biking with Rider, Anneke and Britta.”

“After Hannah’s project the other day on Sierra Leone and the diamond trade. I was thinking that people would do almost anything to get a shiny little pebble. Greed can sometimes be so de-humanizing”

Then Jesse read, “As I Ponder’d in Silence” by Walt Whitman.

1

As I ponder’d in silence,

Returning upon my poems, considering, lingering long,

A Phantom arose before me, with distrustful aspect,

Terrible in beauty, age, and power,

The genius of poets of old lands,

As to me directing like flame its eyes,

With finger pointing to many immortal songs,

And menacing voice, What singest thou? it said;

Know’st thou not, there is but one theme for ever-enduring bards?

And that is the theme of War, the fortune of battles,

The making of perfect soldiers?

2

Be it so, then I answer’d,

I too, haughty Shade, also sing war—and a longer and greater one than

any,

Waged in my book with varying fortune—with flight, advance, and

retreat—Victory deferr’d and wavering,

(Yet, methinks, certain, or as good as certain, at the last,)—The

field the world;

For life and death—for the Body, and for the eternal Soul,

Lo! too am come, chanting the chant of battles,

I, above all, promote brave soldiers.

Then Eric talked about us the sevies and the eighties. He said that our culture celebrates certain turning points in people’s lives like when someone turns 18 or 21. But looking back on his life Eric said that those weren’t really the turning points, the real times are seventh through ninth grade. The eight graders are in the middle of it and I (Eric) can see the adult part in people like Rider, Aylee, Sarah and Anna. “But we all have to be totally in the moment.”

Then he went on to say that all of the ninth grade science classes are really good. This year’s ninth graders don’t have a bad case of ninth-gradeitis, a common disease among ninth graders that induces heavy bouts of slacking and spasms of not-caring-because-we’re-are-leaving.

He also talked about some attitude and mind-set of a certain student in the school. “I clearly see you growing, but I want to see you leap” and, “When people get behind they scramble to catch up, and the quality of their work goes down a lot.”

After that morning meeting Eric instructed us to “Rip out the paper carefully” and “Write a letter to yourselves about things that you have liked about yourself, like about yourself and want to like about yourself.” We all went to work, writing letters to ourselves that Eric will send to us in 10 to 12 years. The room was silent, a few whispers here and there “Dude, you are so messed.” One boy quietly jokes to another. Eric gives us a good lesson on stamps, letters and addressing envelopes.

Onward to the first activity of the day, the beginning of our Utopia cities/communities/places. Eric told us to research a Utopia society and base or place off it. A bunch of people tumbled outside to start a community on part of the nature trail. Others stayed inside to research their place. There was the bustle of getting tools, raking the paths, setting up territory, and building the beginnings of a Utopia. For the next two hours or so everyone was working, laughing, eating lunch, and having fun in the wonderful spring weather.

“Don’t use plywood,” was uttered by Eric to forgetful students at least a dozen times.

Each place was based off someone’s project from the year so far:

Main St. USA: Hannah, Lydia, Aylee, Rider, Claire, Oliver-- Based on Henry's project on the 60s and the 70s.

Sherwood Inc.: Henry, Isabel, Edgar, Anna, Reed Ma, Miles, Jesse--Based on Quakers & Humanism

Causa: Cassie, Reed Me, Evan, Rio, Calder, Sophie, Luke---Based on Reed Ma’s project on Koinania Farms/Partners

The Renaissance: Nate, Bryne, Sarah, Simon, Kiley, Anneke, Yared--Based on Reed Me’s project on The Renaissance

The next activity was to answer questions on a sheet. The questions ranged from: “If you were going to be stuck on a desert island with one book of poetry, which of the following authors would you want it to be?” to “In which of the following would you choose to live:” All of the questions were multiple choice and we were to answer the question based on what we thought our ninth graders would have thought we would say. The day before they had written down their guesses of what we would pick and if we guessed the correct one then we would get ‘one checkmark’. It was a test of how well our ninth graders knew us and how well we knew them. The results are in percentage:

Main St: Winner with 59%

Renaissance: #2 with 52%

Sherwood inc.: #3 with 46%

Causa: #4 with 42%

To wrap up the day, the groups took part in a competition created by Hannah and Lydia, specifically designed for their team to win. It was a fashion show, with the ‘clothes’ made only of natural materials found in the nearby woods. We were given half an hour to find all the materials we needed and create a costume. After our half hour was up we piled into the Big Room and everyone did his or her model walk on the Big Room table. Eric videotaped the whole thing, even when Riders costume exploded (no students were injured).

Thursday

Again we piled into the Big Room and crowded around the table.

“I felt that yesterday, Rider was a ninth grader”

“The other night I was talking to my dad about Hannah’s project about greed and de-humanization and I had a really good time talking with him.”

“Lately Hannah and I have been emailing each other about things that we love and I have been feeling a lot closer to her. We have been telling each other all of the big things and the small things”

Everyone had a really good time yesterday working on the Utopias.

Then Simon read two poems, “The City” and “Ionic” both by Cavafy

"The City"

By C. P. Cavafy

You said: “I’ll go to another country, go to another shore,

Find another city better than this one.

Whatever I try to do is fated to turn out wrong

And my heart lies buried like something dead.

How long can I let my mind moulder in this place?

Wherever I turn, wherever I look,

I see the black ruins of my life, here,

Where I’ve spent so many years, wasted them, destroyed them totally.”

You won’t find a new country, won’t find another shore.

This city will always pursue you.

You’ll walk the same streets, grow old

in the same neighborhoods, turn gray in these same houses.

You’ll always end up in this city. Don’t hope for things elsewhere:

there’s no ship for you, there’s no road.

Now that you’ve wasted your life here, in this small corner,

you’ve destroyed it everywhere in the world.

Ionic

By C.P. Cavafy

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.

Eric then instructed us to write down things that we felt were either an issue from yesterday or something that was good that happened. After a few minutes of intense scribbling we all were assigned jobs to do outside; fill potholes, work on the bread oven roof and work on our garden.

After that we all competed in a competition made by ninth graders Henry, Isabel and Edgar. This particular contest was designed so that the team Sherwood Inc. would have the best chance at winning. There were four parts, made specifically for the four team-members Anna, Reed Ma, Jesse and me (Miles). The first challenge was for the team to set up the projector as fast as they could to show a movie. When movie is projecting and sound is playing the timer stops. They weren’t allowed to do anything that might harm any equipment. This part was designed for me because I was probably the most technological savvy person in the room.

All the teams scurried around plugging in cords, pushing buttons and all the while everyone was yelling, singing or screaming.

Renaissance: 2 min 40 sec;

Sherwood Inc.: 3 min 44 sec;

Causa: 8 min 5 sec;

Main St USA: more than 10 minutes

Next we had to pick one person on our team to do a ballet move. This section was created so that the only practiced ballerina in the school, Anna, would win. After a few moments of discussion and practice the ballerinas performed.

Sherwood Inc -- "Balancé" by Anna;

Causa -- "Indebouler" by Sophie;

Renaissance -- "Plié en Point" by Sarah

Main St. USA -- "Arabesque" by Rider

Next we were to write down all the information we had as a group about any one specific disease – no books or Internet allowed. This one was designed for Jesse because the week before she had attended a 12 hour-long lecture on Lyme disease with her dad.

Sherwood Inc: "Lyme Disease"

Renaissance: "Ebola" a very close second...

Main St. USA: "Mad Cow Disease"

Causa: "Mesothelioma"

To wrap up the contest we were to sing a song taught at a local elementary school – the entire team must sing. This part was for Reed Ma who knew a lots of different songs from her time at the Lincoln School.

Main St. USA with "Twas Friday Night"

Sherwood Inc. with "One Bottle of Pop"

Renaissance with " Morning Town"

Causa with " This Land is Your Land"

The following competition was created for The Renaissance by Nate and Bryn. ‘Write a poem by yourself in your own separate places in the woods for 10 minutes. Your poem should be about a small thing that you are looking at in the woods. When Eric rings the bell, your group will come together. You will then have 20 minutes to combine your poems into one. You must use at least 2 lines from each individual's poems.’ We did this and the ninth graders will be judging them on Monday.

Here are the poems:

Poem #1:

had it once been a wonder,

a bird watching its mother fly,

one small pin prick,

from the never ending patterns,

am I greater than the dead?

Don't follow me into the rain

where the glittering water

will cling

to my one beat pulse.

Am I dead,

truly dead

trying to see

the problems in falling

down to touch the small tender plant

but they don't pay me any attention

for I am the revolver.

Poem #2

Why do we reach?

color piercing my clouded vision

I look closely, letting my eyes blur,

focus,

then blur again

fingers stretching up from a barrier

a fallen tree, roots reaching to the sky

A crazy intertwinement of life beating with green simplicity

why do we reach

with so many fingers

touching shadows

seeming lost.

they stretch to the gentle blue

held forever in existence

catch soft fragrance filling me

the world is a black and white,

disguised in color

keeping the silence

making the ripples last

this is the closest I can get.

Poem #3

The birds sing in the distance,

Searching for something, someone,

Days go, fluttering by on

Starched wings, flapping drunkenly,

because maybe they are happy too.

You are innocent as a child,

the little flower, the shining world,

what do you know of life?

The blue sky makes me laugh,

and the sun makes me think.

But is it perfect?

Grey rocks, white rocks-

they blend together, none like the other,

but each the same.

A square packet flapping,

proclaiming organic,

when all it does is fade,

the sky, itself, the grass-

we are tearing down, as we build up.

But still we know,

from the woman laughing, hair stirred,

the child, inquisitive eyes wide,

the old man, who raises his head,

and goes on,

for so much longer,

with so much more.

Poem #4

A life of change

Cowering before its conqueror

Shaking without love

Among the behemoths

Dancing over broken glass

Blood splattered yet beautiful

Something so terrible

Something so dazzling

A golden glow is evident

Yet is goes unnoticed,

By the bees who bring you death

Death that allows you to change

Ripen red and sweet.

You can call death a weed

But you only have to look

To know it isn't true.

Then to wrap up the day we all watched the movie “Green Fried Tomatoes” and ate chocolate ordered from Koinania Partners.

Wednesday, On the Hike (Day one) (by Edgar)

We all arrived at the trailhead and started to load up the food. Mia, after handing us all the food, fell backwards as to give us an assurance that this is going to be real easy. Over the course of the day every one of us talked to each other and walked alone for part of the hike. The day was beautiful and back wrenching. We arrived at the camp about an hour or two earlier then the previous groups of ninth graders before us. At camp we set up the sleeping bags and pads and hammock. Yes, there was a hammock. Nathan decided to bring his father’s hammock and stretch it across Lydia, Reed and myself. I was hesitant of Nathan falling on me for a reason: it happened. Luckily it was just my legs and it wasn’t high up. The nail Nathan had hung on end up on turned to release the weight. Later Nathan fixed the hammock so as it would not fall. Since we had time to kill before dinner and bed we decided to play some games. One game was were you say a word that is basically two words put together. You then must create a word from the last part of the word before and the person to not find a word loses. We played this for a while until everyone was in then it eventually died down. Later that evening there was a new game in which you create sentences by having people go around in a circle and say a word that goes with what has already been said. Here are some examples of what we created.

Hiking, happily, in, forests, in, outer, Mongolia, however, my, hair, allows, Lydia, to, Eat, noodles.

Fire, Burns, Evil, loud, boys, except, our, stick, which, we, will, sharpen, at, coolly, glen, shelter. No, one, survives, except, meditating, wolverines, and, wonderful, loving, Chris.

Later Tal had us summarize how our day was through three words, here they are:

Long trail moose-crap

Separated in swamp

Climbing happy fire

Joyful bullying cozy

Wet tired rejoice

Mud voices, smoke

Mia’s homemade jerky

Love supple swamp

Noise laughter love

Filtration purity brook

Poem view firs

Listening Reed’s laughter

Rainless rocks serenity

Silly sublime sore

After dinner Tal told us the story of the Goshen man. And we went to bed with laughter and conversations of how/ what we feel through questions. At five in the morning people started to stir thinking it was six by the amount of light outside. Half an hour later I decided to start a fire because it was so cold. A couple of people agreed, with one small misinterpretation. Five minutes later Rose walked from the bathroom and started to help with the fire. Right when the fire was at a blaze Tal arose from a path with a stern face. “You guys, its five thirty in the morning! Go back to bed!” he said while making angry hand gestures. “Oh crud,” I thought. I let the fire die down as everyone went back to bed. Later when it was actually time to get up Tal explained why he was so grumpy but also that he had to be somewhat nice because we were, after all, starting a fire.

Day #2 on the Hike, By Bryn

I woke to the sound of Edgar’s loud whisper on the other side of the Cooley Glen Shelter. My feet were cold on the bottom of my sleeping bag and I tried to curl my feet closer together to retain some heat. My eyes were heavy, but I sat up anyway and the air was freezing. The sun hadn’t yet risen and I wondered how early it was.

“Edgar, what time is it?” I asked. I heard others stirring around, but I couldn’t see any of their faces because the sleeping bags were pulled all across their bodies.

“Edgar, go to sleep.” I heard someone say.

“I’m going to start a fire.” Edgar said and was out of his sleeping bag and to the pit of charred logs from the night before.

“Edgar, it’s 5:30.” I heard Lydia say with her head sticking up out of the sleeping bag. Edgar came back to his sleeping bag and I laid back and listened to the soft breathing of my fellow 9^th graders lull me to sleep again. The next thing I heard was Tal’s voice and cool hair floating in through my sleeping bag.

“It’s 7:25,” He said and I slowly sat up as the cold air flowed over my head and the sun shinned brightly all around the shelter. I watched as a film was across my eyes started to clear and Tal started to pour water into the metal pot. Smoke rose from the newly made fire and everyone started to groan and move around me looking at the fire with bleary eyes. In a slow daze we all got up with our hair in every which way and blowing on our fingers to keep warm. We all moved sluggishly for a while until the water was boiling and Chai and oatmeal with blueberries (that Mia so thoughtfully brought along) were being consumed and then we were happier, moving with more of a sting in our steps. It is the second day, the hardest day, we had all been told by Tal, 8.5 miles and up hill most of the way, rocky and snowy and eating while standing up on the trail. It was the day were there were amazing views and cliffs to climb with just the packs on our backs.

“Leave no trace!” Tal kept saying and we only half listened, smiling to ourselves as we packed up. Finally we were all packed up our backpacks lined up along the bottom of the shelter. Tal passed around the bag of poems and we each took the one that we picked for the second day of the hike. 13 poems, Walt Whitman, T.S Elliot, Rumi, E.E Cummings, Bill Waterson, all trying to say the same but different things. To love the things more then we fully understand and to be able to let go and also hang on so hard.

The beginning we went straight up along slippery rocks and broke thin ice covering muddy puddles, the sun was so bright and shone onto the smooth veins of small leaves. We stepped over many fallen trees and tripped over our feet and laughed as we looked in each other’s eyes. There was a time when I was alone, a group behind me and a group in the front. I couldn’t hear anything, I wasn’t sure where I was, I didn’t know even if I was on the right trail and the only way for me to know I wasn’t lost were the tracks of the hiking boots left on the dry rocks. I stood for a moment as I reached the top and I could hear both groups, all of the laughter and talking and I was in the middle surrounded by everything I ever wanted. As I reached the top the wind blew harder and the smiles were brighter and closer, I was with them again. We hiked down together in a line, closer now, watching the feet in front of us, showing each other the right path down the steep rocks. Just keep going,, we had to say to each other, talking and also silence, the enjoyment of grins and memories that we forgot we ever had. We finally got to Skylight Pond at 5:30; we pulled off our hot, wet hiking boots and looked at the smooth pond. The day got slowly darker around us. All of the 9^th graders hiked up to the view above the cabin, the rocks that seemed to look over everything. We sat in a line, stretches of pale pinks across the mountains that were vividly blue. The wind was strong and we picked the pine needle off of the little pine trees and threw them into the gusts and they flew back at us against a sky that would never forget.

We hiked back after that, to Annie’s mac and cheese and pesto pasta made by Rose and Mia. Tal made a fire outside of the cabin and we all sat around, close, but not too close. We smiled and stared at the smoke swirling up above our heads, reading out loud from the log book of the cabin and laughing so hard it was hard to stop. We eventually went back into the cabin and lay next to each other and I felt like I was one of the last to fall asleep, because I didn't want to forget the warm, soft breathing that surrounded me with some sort of non-explainable joy that resonated in my bones and I feel asleep without meaning to close my eyes in the darkness.

Day #3 on the Hike, By Bryn

I woke up on Friday morning to the fog outside of the small window and the breathing of the people I loved around me and I remembered that it was always the last day; it was truly the end now. The air was cold even in the cabin, but the warmth of the bodies around me gave me some sort of comfort. We all had cups of hot chocolate, instant oats and one blueberry each. The day was wet, but not raining, we were sitting in a cloud and as we went outside to find our hiking boots soggy from sitting out in the rain. More packing, slowly. It was the last day, only 5 miles, it was harder today though because we after all were tired and the day seemed wetter then it had any other day so far. I looked out at the pond and could barely see the other side and somehow that made we feel warmer, surrounded by something warm. We all stood around in the cabin and spilling out in the porch. It was the last poems of the three days, we all knew it was almost the end; we were still striving to end this time and this year. I closed my eyes for a moment and let the voices float into me and make me remember what they said and the familiar sounds that meant so much. We started off again, up and then mostly down. Tal told stories of his past life, of his mentor, Bernie, and as we stopped for lunch, a man running from Middlebury College was running and stopped to talk for a second. Tal said that he was the first person they had seen in on the trail in four years.

The sun finally came out and I could see everything was brighter and more beautiful then I ever remembered, I started to hold on tighter to the people around me, getting closer to their feet as I walked because I wanted to know that everything was ending. As we walked down the end of the trail in silence I saw the beauty of my class and it wasn’t hard to say how much they have always kept me moving. As we stumbled out of the trail I saw every face of all the 9^th graders as bright beacons of wonder and love. As we walked across the concrete road and to the sign across from us. We sat in front of the sign and it finally sunk it, that it was the end, that we were so strong, so wonderfully together in that moment. Tal turned to all of us and told us he had to read one last thing, for the end, we had to hear this. It was by T.S Elliot out of his book Four Quartets.

Home is where one starts from.

As we grow older

The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated

Of dead and living. Not the intense moment

Isolated, with no before and after,

But a lifetime burning in very moment

And not the lifetime of one man only

But of old stones that cannot be deciphered

There is a time for the evening under starlight,

A time for the evening under lamplight

(The evening with the photograph album).

Love is not nearly itself

When here and now cease to matter

Old men ought to be explorers

Here and there does not matter

We must be still and still moving

Into another intensity

For a further union, a deeper communion

Through the dark cold and the empty desolation

The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters

Of the petrel and the porpoise

In my end is my beginning