Sudden Angels Part 5: Nan

This is how I first saw Nan--bent over and busy.  I only knew her as the blonde head among blossoms, clipping and trimming, garden debris flying behind her.

For three years, I walked our dog Maria in silence past her house. So I was startled one morning when she emerged from her garage as I turned down the alley. Face to face for the first time, I told her how much I admired her flowers. She thanked me. We both moved on.

Once our parallel lines intersected, however, we kept colliding on the sidewalk. We chatted. She invited me over for coffee.

I told her what a talent it was to grow lovely flowers. She said it was luck and persistence. "You try something here and watch. If it doesn't grow, you dig it up and move it elsewhere," she said.

Nan told me what a talent it was to write stories. I said it was luck and persistence. "You try this and that with a character, and if it doesn't work, you move it elsewhere," I said.

Out of nowhere, we became friends. Sometimes it happens like that. You wonder why you ever hesitated. In short order, as our stories unfolded, I understood how similar our lives were thematically. There was endless comfort in that. But not for long.

When we put our house on the market this spring, our agent brought in a professional stager who, in that Martha Stewart way, wanted our household turned perfectly inside out. Streamlined and gleaming. All colors coordinated.

"We have to add pops of red outside to attract buyers," I wailed to Nan, who understood by now that I had no talent for landscaping. "I'll pick you up in the morning," she offered. For an hour, she led me down the greenhouse aisles, holding up pots of this and that, asking if I wanted something with more yellow. Or something that trailed. Or something fluffier. At the end, she grabbed tiny white pinprick blooms to add something soft and airy "to set off the red in the geraniums and begonias."

She wasn't singing "Bippity-Boppity-Boo," but I felt the transforming breeze from her wand.

Because I had another real estate brushfire to extinguish across town, she promised to show up the next morning with tools and potting soil to plant everything so we could make the photographer's deadline. And she did. I returned home to brilliant reds in all the right places.

The house sold in a day. Now I have to leave Nan.

Here's what I want you to know about angels. They are not always vertical travelers who sail down on golden rays, as we're led to believe. They can exist on the same horizontal line we travel, bent over among the lilies, waiting to be noticed.

Nan's power was more than those artfully arranged red flowers in our yard. Because of her, I was no longer a stranger in my neighborhood. Someone knew me. Someone watched for me.

Being recognized is a blessing.

I simply had to summon the courage to offer a compliment. Because even angels need kindness.


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Something about Elephants

When it comes to elephants, children aren't afraid. Although huge, they seem approachable. Maybe it's because they don't have claws or fangs or scales. Maybe it's because that curling trunk and tail are odd but happy features.

And who doesn't want to whisper into those enormous ears? A secret could be lost in there forever.

Maggie was crazy about them when she was a little girl. Her comforter was imprinted with Victorian zoo elephants in elaborate gazebos. She had a collection of souvenir elephants. When her class made kitchen magnets for the parents, she drew Ella, her favorite stuffed animal.

When Cliff taught first grade, it was an elephant who finally turned the tide with a difficult class. They were a group of mismatched spirits given to arguing, refusing to compromise with each other. Knowing it would be a long, unhappy year, he decided to show them the value of creating a community by creating a gigantic task that could only be successful as a group effort.

An elephant saved the day.

They studied India as a lesson in geography and culture. Traditionally kids drew maps or gave historical reports about the country, but these were solitary endeavors. Cliff changed it up by announcing they would draw a life-sized Indian elephant and divided them into groups: the eye committee, tail committee, front leg committee, etc. They researched their assigned dimensions, a process that forced them to talk to each other. Then he asked them to bring in newspapers, which tells you this happened before the days of the internet. As a class, they estimated how many sheets they'd have to tape together to form a large enough surface to draw the animal. They pushed all the tables and chairs against the wall, another maneuver that required them to work together.

Each group had a roll of tape and stack of newspaper. Each member had to get a turn taping. More cooperation was required because everyone couldn't hold the tape at once.

Then they realized the eye couldn't be drawn until the head was sketched in. The tail couldn't hang in midair. The stomach had to wait for the leg placement. Much conversation ensued. Kids were patient with each other. Markers were handed back and forth. They positioned themselves around the perimeter and began to cut--without bumping each other.

Instead of accusing and blaming, the room was filled with giggles and silence as the elephant took shape. The scraps were collected, and it became a lesson in recycling, too.

When the amazing animal was drawn, Cliff extended the lesson by asking questions requiring educated estimates and concrete actions like: How many children can line up on the length of a trunk? How many of your feet equal the length of the elephant's foot? How many hands fit on the eye?

Children once determined to get in front of each other, scooted over for someone else to add a little hand. They guessed together and listened to each other.

Yes, they created a huge elephant. More importantly, they learned a huge lesson about the power of cooperation.

Any teacher can present facts. Any teacher can grade fill-in-the-blank worksheets. Only a remarkable teacher can create invaluable life lessons. With the help of an elephant, he showed a class how to see each other.


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The Truest Clock

My husband Cliff has been retired for almost a year now. He served forty-one years in elementary education at public and private schools. During that time, he taught everything from pre-school through sixth grade and spent half his career as a principal.

Never once was he wrong about anything in a school. Ever.

Cliff had the rare ability to sit in a classroom for thirty minutes and tell you if the teacher was any good. Then he'd tell you which children were over placed, which were troubled, and which were falling through the cracks. But he wouldn't develop a list of issues and walk away. He'd tell you how to address them. He'd give you a Plan A to improve each case, and if that failed, he'd suggest Plan B. He was known to trot out Plan C and D, too. Cliff never gave up with anyone who was willing--adult or child.

After he'd been at a school for a year, he could pinpoint the flaws in the curriculum, the staffing weak links, and the dark reality slinking beneath the fancy mission statement. He gave vision to schools that were wandering. Grateful teachers insisted they learned more from him than any education course. Devoted parents worshipped him for showing them how to appreciate their own children.

I have never encountered anyone else like him in the school business.

Make no mistake, however. Not everyone listened. Many resisted his advice. Still, many apologized when they finally understood he was right and that the contentious issue was never about him at all.

Early in his administrative career, he found himself twisting in the wind over a problem that would leave someone dissatisfied, no matter which decision he made. His seasoned head of school said, "You have to stand for something at the end of the day. That becomes your North. Never lose sight of it."

Cliff understood he would always be King Solomon, demanding the baby be cut in half, in order to save it. A master of paradox, he consistently chose to do the right thing for the child, despite prevailing pressures. He knew a child was infinitely more than a commodity, a test score, a trophy. A few years ago, an admiring colleague nicknamed Cliff "Don Quixote" because of his relentless courage in the face of arrogant supervisors, jealous contemporaries, and selfish parents. One after another, Cliff faced those ignorant windmills in his weathered armor.

I recently heard a celebrated businessman explain his findings after interviewing thousands of leaders of all kinds of organizations around the world and their employees. He discovered the ultimate traits of a leader are truth and trust. Intelligence and skilled spin-doctoring pale by comparison. In other words, generosity and honesty win the day, and these are the virtues that develop with experience, perceptive experience.

You can't learn that from a book or a PR firm or a high-dollar consultant. You can't strong arm your way around what's real.

You carry it in your heart. Or you don't. No one can teach it to you.

Children always found the truth in Cliff. It shows in these two sweet notes from students.

Mr. Clark, you plan a lot of fun things. You tell a lot of nice storys (sic). You are so creatof (sic). I'm never afraid to talk to you because yore (sic) nice to me. You make everyone in school feel happy. No one else is like you.

A school without Mr. Clark is lonely.

The school dedicated a row of apple trees in his honor, and those new sprouts meant more to him than gifts and a luncheon. He understood the value of time and the power of growth--in trees, for sure, but more importantly in the children who play beneath their branches.

When he was at a school in Illinois, the Rockford Register Star invited him to write about education.

ALLOWING CHILDREN TO FIND THEIR BALANCE
By Cliff Clark

When our antique mantle clock quit ticking after we moved from Wisconsin, we felt certain that we had ruined the delicate timepiece. But we took this family heirloom to a master clock maker who discovered that it merely needed to be placed on a level surface and then it would run again. Indeed, the clock needed time to balance, not new parts.

The same can be said regarding children. When they are put in a "level" space, they, too, can find balance and harmony. With this balance they can better accept the challenges that lie ahead and probably even survive the rat race we call adulthood.

Frequently I have spoken to children about the inner time we all possess which sometimes pays only veiled regard to the calendar and birthdays. The speed at which the clock ticks can generally be adjusted only by the grade in school where the child is placed. This is the same clock that determined when we walked, talked, fed ourselves, learned to tie shoelaces, and it continues to run throughout our lives. We owe it to our children to help set the rhythm of the clock's ticks. Every child's inner clock is  unique.

A child's journey begins when adults become aware of the whole child during his or her first school experience. Too often we become extremely excited by the academic prowess displayed in our children. At the same time, we are sometimes unable to see equally important emotional and behavioral considerations.

All three are important facets of the the developing child. When one is out of balance, the child falters. When two are misaligned, the child fails. Unfortunately we are apt to focus on intellectual performances as the only measure of success. We forget that a forest is more than one tree.

Noted child psychologist David Elkind refers to the "hurried child," who is a manifestation of "over placement" in school. Often inordinate peer pressure is applied to the immature child who can't keep pace with classmates and also experiences organizational and social difficulties. The immature child might be encouraged to assume more responsibility but is unable to move forward BECAUSE of that immaturity. Many believe tutoring during the summer will provide a chance to catch up, forgetting that those other classmates will not hold still developmentally.

Early childhood classrooms frequently have this sign: Childhood Should Be A Journey, Not a Race. Keeping that significant statement in mind, you will find there are many master clock makers at your child's school. Listen to their collective wisdom and to your own heart to ensure your child's safe journey through childhood.

A life can offer several careers, several homes, and even several spouses. There is only one childhood.


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Two Mothers, Two Daughters, One Moon

I used to think I turned the pages of my life, but not anymore. Not quite at least. Now I believe circumstances and faces and objects steadily float past me, and the trick is learning which details have meaning and how to catch them.

When we adopted Maggie from China, I became a stay-at-home mother. I'd had careers, but nothing ever stuck. I'd always been waiting for something else.

During our first year, Maggie and I did pretty well at home, all things considered. She'd spent the first eleven months of her life in a huge Guangdong orphanage, so the quiet of our house and my constant attention surely kept her surprised.

I was an only child who had briefly babysat when I was in high school. Clearly, I didn't know up from down about children, but I knew our world had to expand.

We tried Mommy and Me Gymnastics. The college-student instructor was beside herself with frustration. For one thing, I was old enough to be the mother of the other mothers. Next, we owned no athletic clothes. Class began with screaming children jumping into a pit filled with foam blocks. Maggie whispered, "I don't want to jump into a hole, Mama." I couldn't disagree.

We tried an art event. Maggie didn't want to draw the assigned lesson. I finished hers while no one was looking.

I re-thought my outreach plan. We went to a bookstore, where our clothes were suitable. We loved sitting. We loved quiet. We loved books. That's where we found Owl Moon by Jane Yolen.

Each time I got to the part where the little girl sees the owl, Maggie placed her hand on the page. I have no idea why. But her tiny fingers showed me a book can find a child's heart.

Money was tight in our house on one income, so I told her the book lived in the store, but we could visit it. Because it was a Caldecott winner, they kept copies on hand. On every trip, as I pushed her stroller through the door, Maggie said, "Find it." I knew which book she meant.

So when I tried to write an adoption picture book and the plot stalled, I returned to Owl Moon and realized one economical sentence after another took that little girl on an important nighttime adventure. There was my map for Sweet Moon Baby: An Adoption Tale. 

When it was published, it was difficult to know if my book mattered until an author event brought a particular family to my autograph table. The father chatted with me while his adopted two-year-old Chinese daughter flipped through the pages of her book, clearly looking for something. She stopped at the picture of the baby floating away in a basket. She pressed her little hand on the page and smiled at me. She thought she was showing me a picture. I knew she was showing me her heart.

It was a recent, accidental click on my computer that led me to a page about Jane Yolen's Picture Book Boot Camp at her Massachusetts farmhouse. Knowing that points were surely converging, I enrolled for four inspiring days about writing and publishing. More significantly for me, however, I learned Jane took fifteen years to write Owl Moon, and the unnamed girl in the story is her daughter Heidi. I struggled for years to write Sweet Moon Baby, and the unnamed girl in my book is my daughter Maggie.

I went a long way for these details:

The moon is forever the moon, a shining mirror of everlasting promise.
One daughter looked at it and saw an owl.
One daughter looked at it and saw a home.
Two mothers looked at it and saw their daughters.

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Making Black Sheep: The Group Consequence Fallacy

One evening Cliff delivered popcorn to Maggie, who had stayed home from school with a cold that day. Her first grade teacher had sent the treat. She cried.

It took a while to understand her distress, but the popcorn signified a special reward party that she'd missed.

The teacher kept a set of tally marks on the board to measure good and bad student actions in the class. Good things received checkmarks. Bad things meant checkmarks were erased. When the class achieved the designated number of plusses, they got a popcorn party. On the day of Maggie's absence, the long-awaited event was held.

She missed the reward. Receiving stale popcorn in isolation was hardly the same experience.

Cliff was dismayed by such a public checks and balances system because he knew the hazards. Misbehavior was called out, embarrassing the guilty child. Well-behaved classmates were "punished" for the infractions of others because the checkmarks they had worked to earn were erased. Over time, it's typically repeat offenders who are continually guilty of lost points. Consequently, they are resented by the other children. They become the black sheep.

This kind of group consequencing makes the other children responsible for monitoring and mentoring their impulsive classmates, never an effective idea. How often in life does the disorganized child turn in his homework on time because he wants the others to be rewarded? When does a mean child hold back a cruel comment, knowing a handful of popcorn hangs in the balance?

In group consequencing, the teacher's hands are clean because children are expected to do the controlling and reforming. The misbehaved are supposed to be magically transformed or humiliated into modeling the better choices of others.

Who is the paid professional in the classroom anyway?

Because Cliff was the middle school principal, he spoke with the lower school principal about the matter. She admitted she was aware of the situation and had mentioned it, but he continued his program. She urged Cliff to see if he could make any progress since his own daughter had been punished by the reward system.

In his most thoughtful manner, Cliff, who knows every last thing about developmental behavior and how to build a cohesive classroom community, explained the dark side of blackboard tally marks. He  discussed the negative self-images that develop from public shaming. He illustrated the benefits of working one-on-one with problematic children to turn their attitudes around privately. He detailed ways to help children contribute positively to a group. He talked about the power of getting the parents onboard to change inappropriate steps they might be taking at home.

Change doesn't happen overnight, but it takes the burden off classmates who are truly helpless. Left to their own devices, Cliff explained how damaging underground student retaliation could become--with no one winning and someone getting hurt.

Maggie's first grade teacher didn't argue or ask questions. He simply shrugged his shoulders and said, "The system works for me."

When Cliff reported his results, the lower school principal shrugged her shoulders, too.

People discuss education constantly--academic excellence, teacher unions, standardized tests. It's a lengthy list.

But none of that matters if schools aren't willing to roll up their sleeves and develop children who are intrinsically motivated to do the right thing.

And you can't get there with a popcorn party.

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When Plan B Fails

I know about parenting books. I've referred to them for things like teething, temperatures, and tantrums.

Looking back, now that Maggie is in high school, I believe those were the easy times. The really big things that happen in the teen years are not so neatly covered. There's no easy way through these disappointments or resentments or misunderstandings. These are life's bitter-pill lessons.

I long for the years when it was just me, a baby, a thermometer, and chapter three.

Maggie came home last night, discouraged by a faculty decision. She was devastated because she'd followed her father's advice: Always have a Plan B. She'd presented the teacher with her Plan A. If that didn't work, she handed him her Plan B. He said he understood.

The next day he handed her Plan C.

She wondered how it collapsed and why the teacher would get it wrong. She was so certain she had all her ducks in a row before the meeting.

There isn't a book on the face of the earth with the right answer.

It was up to me, armed with a cup of coffee, to help her corral those honking ducks. So I reminded her of the adage that the journey is more important than the destination. But the journey is the hard part, I told her.

You thought you were headed to India with the right map in hand, only to realize you'd ended up in Peru. After wailing and whining, all you can do is settle down and recalibrate.

Whatever happened, you have to make another decision. Stay put and make the best of it? Return home? Get another map? Resent the person who sold you the wrong map?

No one ever knows. No one. Especially the people who are convinced they know precisely what you should do.

Sometimes those unexpected detours turn out to be the best thing. While you're puzzled under a Peruvian shade tree, hopeless and alone, the carriage of a lifetime can stop and offer a free ride. Getting sidetracked can be a blessing.

How do you know? You don't. Blessings always come disguised as something else--something that wasn't intended, something that's a last resort, something that's impossible.

Still, mistakes can work magic.

Ultimately, you have to believe in yourself. You have to be brave, even if it requires pretending. Courageous folks learn to find the way, step by step, map or no map. By flashlight or full moon or candle, there's a passage through the dark. Even if it means crawling on your hands and knees.

Decide. You have to know at the end of the day that you tried like crazy to organize those wing-flapping ducks. And even if they're still zigzagging ahead of you, at least they're running for the horizon.

And the horizon, the place of promise, belongs to no map. It defies paper. It is the clear, vertical space ahead that only your eyes can define, that is colored your particular blue. The horizon is different for everyone.

Even for ducks.


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Saved by Nancy Pearl

Be honest.

It's February, and those ferocious New Year's Resolutions have crashed.

You haven't lost 12 pounds, exercised for 30 minutes daily or cleaned the closets. Me either.

Change-worthy improvement, however, is still possible. I realized this at Starbuck's. If you stand there long enough, you'll find wisdom.

On the cup sleeves beside me were Oprah's sentiments:

Your life is big. Keep reaching.
Live from the heart of yourself. Seek to be whole, not perfect.
Know what sparks the light in you. Then use that light to illuminate the world.
You are here not to shrink down to less, but to blossom into more of who you are. 

I tried to imagine my big life. Write a novel? Visit The Orkney Islands? Learn to tap dance? All of the above? Do I start today or can I wait for better weather?

I've been down that embrace imperfection road. I get sidetracked every time. I'm the one straightening street signs and picking up litter in the ditch while everyone else dances barefoot in the rain.

Illuminate the world? It's a little late for me to become Mother Teresa. Could I just say kind things each day to a dozen random strangers? Would that count?

I'm all for blossoming, but more of me might not be the best thing in all circles. From my previous post, you'll understand that Trader Joe's might be reluctant to receive more Karenness.

Don't get me wrong. Oprah's concepts rise like chai-infused steam from my hopeful better self. If I were on a slow boat to China with no obligations or distractions, those would all be fine truths to seek. As it is, I only fret myself into paralysis over these big-picture goals.

By this point in the year, I need a quick fix.

Again, Starbuck's holds a cut-to-the-chase solution. In their "The Way I See It" series, legendary Nancy Pearl, Seattle librarian and author of the Book Lust collection, offers productive, guilt-reducing wisdom on cup #169:

Life's too short to read a book you don't love. At age 50 or younger, give a book 50 pages to see if you like it. Over 50, subtract your age from 100 and that's the number of pages to read before you bail on a book you're not enjoying. And when you turn 100, you get to judge book by its cover!

There's a life-changing strategy you and I can manage if you're a reader, too. Having felt duty-bound since childhood to finish every book I start, I'm thrilled to have a smart woman let me off the hook. She assures us that libraries don't record who finishes a book, nor do they award a Reading Bravely Though Bored Badge.

Go ahead. You're allowed. If you need to practice, deliberately check out a library book that you know isn't YOU. Follow her recipe and BAIL. Notice that she didn't use FAIL.

Maybe that's how you'll blossom this year.

(The closets can wait.)


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