Slice of Life | Reflections on the Teche

Archive for the ‘Slice of Life’ Category

Slice of Life Challenge Day 9: A Sweet Encounter

Posted in Slice of Life, Teaching, Writing, tagged kindergarten, school cafeteria on March 9, 2023| 10 Comments »

Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

On Tuesday mornings, I have cafeteria duty. I hate cafeteria duty. You have to be a cop, making sure the kids follow the procedures and keep the talking to a minimum. “It’s time to eat, not talk. If you continue to talk, you will be asked to leave.” The kind of talk that’s not kind. I do try to greet the kids with a smile and good morning, but breakfast time has one goal. “Eat something.”

When P came in, he didn’t follow procedure. He came straight to me before going through the cafeteria line.

“Good morning,” I said. “I see you have a broken arm. What happened?”

P begins his monologue. A story he has practiced and told before. “I was on my skateboard, and I was trying to go up the two steps, but I hit the first step and fell.”

I express my sympathy, “That must’ve really hurt.”

“Yes, but… that’s not why I’m talking to you. I need help with my tray.”

I jump into action. “Of course, I’ll get your tray for you.” I went through the line, brought him his tray, opened his milk, and packaged, heated breakfast sandwich.

His smile and puppy dog eyes were thanks enough.

Later, I was walking down the hall to transfer to my next school. P’s kindergarten class was dutifully lined up to go to P.E. or library. He stepped out of the line when he saw me and whispered something I couldn’t understand.

I leaned over, put my arm around his good shoulder and leaned in. He whispered, “I love you.”

My heart melted. I actually had tears in my eyes as I wandered out to my car. I’m going to change my perspective on cafeteria duty.

Photo by RODNAE Productions on Pexels.com

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This Photo Wants to be a Poem: Where the Sidewalk Ends

Posted in Photography, Poetry, Slice of Life, This Photo Wants to be a Poem, Writing, tagged #flashdraft, #poemsofpresence, #smallpoems, abandoned sidewalk, Acadians on March 8, 2023| 18 Comments »

The neighborhood I live in used to be known as Paradise Woods. My husband tells me when he was a teenager, it was a popular spot for “parking”. When I walk, I cross over an empty lot to get to another street. Whose land is this? I often wonder. What was here before?

I’ve heard tales that this space was once a dairy farm. Cattle farming was common for early French settlers in southern Acadiana, where we live in Louisiana. Either the LaSalle family or the Daigles owned this property, likely using it as farm land. It’s all legend now. I love thinking about the history of this little walkway as it leads me under a beautiful cedar tree. Who walked this field 100 years ago? We’re all visitors for a short time. If the concrete could talk…

Where the sidewalk ends, photo by Margaret Simon

In the early morn
before the sun rises
before my work day begins,
before the houses wake,
I walk across this path
more sure-footed on solid concrete–
A path that leads to an old cedar tree,
planted by a farmer making shade
for his cattle. I speak to his ghost
and thank him for his hard work,
his dedication to the land,
and his kindness to those
who’ll pass here again
Margaret Simon, flash draft

Every week I invite you to write with me about an image. This post is also a Slice of Life post for this month’s daily challenge at Two Writing Teachers. If you stop by, leave a small poem in the comments and return the favor of reading other poem offerings and writing encouraging words. This is a safe place to write. No judgement allowed. Consider following my blog to get this weekly prompt in your inbox.

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Slice of Life Challenge Day 7: My Teaching Philosophy

Posted in Creativity, Gifted Education, Slice of Life, Writing on March 7, 2023| 6 Comments »

Remember Alice? The sleep-deprived child from my Slice on Saturday? She wanted me to let all my readers know that she took my advice and read The Lightning Thief, our current class novel, before falling asleep rather than watching TV. If you’ve ever read The Lightning Thief, you may not think this is such a good book to read before going to sleep. Talk about wild crazy dreams filled with Minotaurs and such. But the book helped Alice fall asleep at a reasonable hour, so she was enthusiastically ready for class today.

She also wanted me to share her Basquiat art piece.

I asked my students for an idea for today’s Slice of Life, and they pointed to a painting I created years ago in a creativity class for my gifted certification. That class was one of my favorites. I loved my teacher and the projects we did. I went searching for the binder. More than any other class, this one taught me how to embrace my own creativity so that I could encourage it in my gifted students. This was a reminder I needed today.

I found the binder, my final project, in a cubby and hugged it close. I’m so glad I kept it. Looking through the binder was like looking into a time capsule. So many things I had forgotten. But my painting with my teaching philosophy remains on the wall of my classroom today. I still believe in it and try to live it everyday.

In the painting, I analogized creativity with opening a door. In my classroom, I want to make the students feel safe as in a birdhouse that gives them the freedom to explore ideas, discover relationships, and ask questions. A cat symbolizes curiosity; the tree, exploring possibilities; and the planet, discovery. The purple mountains symbolize expanding the horizon, and the wildflowers, flexibility.
Margaret Simon, circa 1999

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Slice of Life Challenge Day 6: Gifts of Grace on the Bayou

Posted in Gratitude, Photography, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged #techeproject, Bayou Teche, great white egret on March 6, 2023| 8 Comments »

A quick video of an egret in flight on Bayou Teche, Louisiana.

What do you do with a perfect day? The temperature was just right, 70 degrees. Not a cloud in the sky. Humidity low. Sunday is our day to catch up and get ready for the work week. We go to church and come home to our individual chores: cat litter, trash cans, lesson plans, laundry, grocery…and I had writing group. “You think we can squeeze in some paddle time?”

I decided that there were a few things I could put off like vacuuming, so I said a resounding, “Yes!” Perfect days are rare, so I feel we must embrace while we can. So we made a date for 4:00 PM. Jeff hosed out the canoe (ants), I grabbed the paddles, and off we went.

Heading directly into the sunset, the colors change. The old leaves on the oaks are a dark green while the new pollen fuzzies are a golden yellow. People complain about this popping of the pollen. It aggravates allergies and covers cars in a fine sprinkle of golden dust. All part of the healthy life cycle of a great live oak tree.

Some, not all, of the cypress trees are showing new growth. These tiny needles are the brightest neons of green. The truest sign of spring.

As we paddled home, Jeff noticed a plastic chair wedged in some tree roots across the bayou. He said, “I think that’s our lost chair.” A few storms ago, the water had risen and taken with it a plastic chair from our yard. Sure enough it was ours. Jeff managed to back the canoe next to it and grab it with his paddle. The chair was a little muddy but still in tact. I had to take a selfie to get a photo of it, so the angle and perspective are odd, but you get the idea.

Jeff rescued our long lost backyard chair.

We were home before the sun set and were treated to the appearance of a great white egret. Grace from God to praise this perfect day. Click on the video above to see this majestic bird in flight.

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Slice of Life Challenge Day 5: An Interview with an Artist

Posted in Slice of Life, tagged Interview with a young artist, Leo's art on March 5, 2023| 11 Comments »

If you are a regular reader of my blog, you have heard of the most famous artist in my life, Leo LeBlanc. He is only 4 years old, but as my dad (an artist himself) told me “If only Van Gogh’s mother had saved all his drawings.” So my daughter Maggie started a shared album on her phone. While he was living, my father took delight in seeing Leo’s art pop up on his phone. He often called me just to talk about it.

Last year, Leo was drawing, as he still does now, with a single marker, filling the page with a line design. Here is a sample of a piece from September 27, 2021 when he wasn’t quite 3 yet.

Now that Leo is four, he is able to speak what his imagination tells him he has drawn. Yesterday after his first soccer game of the season where he spent most of the time on the sidelines eating Goldfish, I took the opportunity to interview him as he was drawing. To me, his grandmother, this is priceless. You will hear his younger sister, Stella in the background. She is saying “I want to sit on you, Mamere.”

M: Hey, Leo LeBlanc, you just made a beautiful piece of art. Could you tell me about it?

L: It’s a boat carrying a parachute right here that carries a coconut.

M: Wow! So is the coconut attached to the boat or the parachute?

L: The parachute is connected to both.

M: To both of them?

L: Like, connected to here, here, here, here, here, here…

L: That’s all part of the parachute.

M: Okay. All right.So what is this?

L: The coconut.

M: And what is this right here?

L: The star on the web.

M: The star on the web?

L: I’m about to draw the web. I just showed the web because I’m going to draw it. I’m not building another coconut. It’s just how it lives like this.

M: What did you just draw?

L: Zigzag.

M: That goes on the boat?

L: Zigzag. A motor has to go. It’s tipping over because it’s a motor boat. Does this look like a motor?

M: It sure does.

L: The tip goes in the water, leans back, they pull the handle, and it goes in the water.They start moving on the steering wheel, and it goes. It tips over.

M: Yeah.Very nice.

L: And there’s a web right here. And the parachute has to go under the boat.This space has to go somewhere. I don’t know what’s coming. Okay, I’m not done.

M: You’re not done? Okay.Thank you very much, Leo LeBlanc.

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Slice of Life: Sleep

Posted in Gifted Education, Slice of Life, tagged Social/ Emotional needs of the gifted on March 4, 2023| 11 Comments »

I teach gifted kids in grades 1-6 at two elementary schools in my district. We use a pull-out program, so I see my kids every day. Alice (not her real name) comes to me at the end of the school day, after second recess and before dismissal. Yesterday she was tired, and I could tell. Her eyes were half closed and she had very little patience for the suggestions I was making about her work.

Alice is very talented, not just in academics, but also in art. However, her perfectionism can get in the way. We were doing an art project in the form of Jean-Michel Basquiat. We watched a video from a Pace artist from the Acadiana Center for the Arts. Following the directions of the teaching artist resulted in a Baquiat-esque painting. Alice did not like what happened when she created her background. “I hate it,” she cried. And tears fell down her little cheeks.

I knew this melt down was not just about the art. She was tired. She had an idea in her head of what she wanted her art to look like, and it wasn’t happening. She’s a calm child. She didn’t tear up the paper. She didn’t cry loudly or need to take a break. I let her figure it out, and by the end of class, she had cut out one of her practice drawings and glued it to a solid background. And I think she left for the weekend somewhat pleased with how she had gathered the strength to at least have something to put in the hall display.

But before all this happened, we talked about her exhaustion. I know that gifted kids have a hard time shutting down their brains to sleep. I also know that research shows you should turn off all screens at least an hour before going to sleep.

Alice: “I’m just tired.”

Me: “Did you watch TV before you went to sleep?”

Alice: “Yes, I always do.”

Cringe on my face, “You know research says that TV stimulates your brain so you won’t get restful sleep if you use it to fall asleep.” I tried to sound logical and not degrading.

A: “I just can’t stop thinking! I need a Notes app for my brain!”

I couldn’t help but laugh! Then I explained to her how a notebook next to her bed could be her notes app for her brain.

She admitted that she would probably totally forget this conversation by the time she would be going to bed. I think we could all use a Notes app for our brains.

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Spiritual Journey & Slice of Life: Meaningful Words

Posted in Slice of Life, Spiritual Growth, Writing on March 2, 2023| 13 Comments »

Some time ago a blogging friend suggested subscribing to The Isolation Journals with Suleika Jaouad. At the time I didn’t know who she was, how amazing, how she has written a book, married Jon Batiste, and that she battles leukemia every day. All I knew was her writing felt like a letter from a friend. Her prompts compelling.

Prompt 230 came from The Renunciations by Donika Kelly. I wrote from the line “Let this be a moment of remembering”

“Let this be a moment of remembering” Donika Kelly

Let us be bird and nest. Let
me curl my toes around this
threshold to flight. You’ll be
waiting with your net of comfort, a
reason or two why this moment
shouldn’t crush me. Eyes of
love, we’ve been here before–remembering.
Margaret Simon, Golden Shovel for Jeff, my nest for 40+ years

This post is also the first Thursday of the month Spiritual Thursday gathering. Today Karen Eastlund is hosting. She suggested we write about “words to fall back on.”

Over and over I fall back on Mary Oliver’s words. The line “You do not have to be good” from Wild Geese gives me the confidence I need to plow through. There will be days that I mess up, say the wrong thing, write something shitty. But we don’t have to “walk on (our) knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.” We can embrace our soft animal body and let it love what it loves.

This Lent I have started writing in my journal using a line from the Bible as a jumping off place. This morning the verse I turned the page to was “You were blameless in your ways from the day that you were created.” Ezekiel 28.15.

My response:

Guilt lives in my backpack.
I carry it with me wherever I go.
I’ve never done enough according to Guilt.
I’ve been selfish and without purpose.
Guilt is heavy and wants to break me.
Some will say, “You’ve done everything you could.”
I wish I believed them.
Where weeds grow, more will come
until you decide
their simple beauty
is within their blamelessness.

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Slice of Life Challenge ’23: Azalea Lane

Posted in Poetry, Slice of Life, Spiritual Growth, tagged #poemsofpresence, #smallpoems, azaleas, Bible response, March, spiritual journey on March 1, 2023| 12 Comments »

Welcome to Day One of the 2023 Slice of Life Challenge. This challenge occurs every year during the month of March. Writing every day is good exercise for a writer. This challenge is sponsored by the Two Writing Teachers, a blog site for writing teachers. They post essays about the teaching of writing, but in March, it’s all about the teachers themselves who understand that being a teacher who writes strengthens the teaching of writing. We are a community of peers. Comments are welcome and encouraged. Comments are the sideline cheers for a marathon runner.

I decided for Lent this year I would read a page in the Bible and then write. I’m not committed to sharing each of these journal scribblings, but I’m starting off today with one.

I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you, and I will make for you a great name.
2 Samuel 7:9

Azalea Lane

I have planted you
in the clay soil of Louisiana.
Most of the year, like Persephone,
you are perfect, leafless, waiting.
You look dormant, dead, but
on the first day of March,
you blossom
and shine
like a pink sunrise
opening,
opening,
opening,
saying to the world,
“I’m here!
I’m wonderful!
I’m beautiful!”

I welcome March, a month of transformation from winter to spring, transformation through the daily practice of shared writing. Thanks for reading.

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Slice of Life: Courir de Mardi Gras

Posted in Slice of Life, Writing, tagged Acadiana Center for the Arts, Courir de Mardi Gras, Eunice Louisiana, Travel on February 28, 2023| 8 Comments »

I have lived in South Louisiana for 40 years, but had never attended the authentic Courir de Mardi Gras. Courir is a French Cajun word meaning run. In the western parishes north of us, there are multiple small towns that have a chicken run. The basic idea is the krewes are going house to house to get all the ingredients for a gumbo. The final ingredient is a chicken. The chicken run is a crazy, wild drunken race to catch the chicken.

I introduced this cultural tradition to my students, and we did chicken art on the Thursday before our Mardi Gras break. We followed a video created by the Acadiana Center for the Arts linked here. The chickens were created using recycled materials. In Courir de Mardi Gras, the costumes are made with scraps of fabric and masks are made with screen. It is the total opposite of New Orleans Mardi Gras which is all about royalty and elaborate beautiful costumes. Courir de Mardi Gras has a captain rather than a king who leads the krewe.

My husband and I became interested in Courir from a performance we saw at the Acadiana Center for the Arts. We decided to go to the parade in Eunice when all the krewes come in, some on horse back. My daughter, son-in-law, and grandkids joined us. We had made some costumes by adding fabric patches and fringe to old clothes. I used an old scarf, some sparkling jewel tape, and an old denim shirt. As the parade came through, Leo was poked (in jest) by a couple tricksters; one of them untied my shoelaces. Afterward there was a band we love to hear and dance to, Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys.

I have to admit I was a bit creeped out by the chickens. I refrained from petting one. They walk close to the crowd to allow for petting. The chickens are surprisingly calm. I gasped when I saw a dead one on the ground. And to top it all off, a woman was wearing a taxidermic chicken on her head. While the band was playing, some of the tricksters got on the stage and threw a live chicken into the crowd. Luckily, I was not close by.

Learning more about the culture of my own state is fascinating and fun. I’m also trying to accept some of the craziness of it all. For the most part, it is harmless fun.

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Slice of Life: Love Letters

Posted in Slice of Life, tagged 1925, Cecil A. Lennan, love letters, love poem on February 14, 2023| 10 Comments »

Our daughter Martha came home this weekend with her 7 week old, June Margaret “Junebug”. We were talking about names and the fact that Margaret is a family name on both sides. My grandmother and my husband’s grandmother were both named Margaret. Apparently Martha didn’t know about Mate’s name, Jeff’s grandmother, because she only knew her as “Mate” and Betsy Ross.

Jeff’s grandmother grew up in Canada. His grandparents’ love story starts with a bad fish. Cecil Lennan was in the hospital in Toronto, Canada and opened his eyes to the love of his life, Margaret Ross. They married in New York City, and Cecil “Pate” nicknamed her Betsy. “Since you are an American now, you should be Betsy Ross.” She was never again called Margaret. New life. New country. New name.

Shortly after their marriage, “Betsy” Ross Lennan traveled back home to her family in Canada. While she was gone, Cecil wrote her letters. This was 1925. We still have three of them. In 2018, I was writing in a workshop and used one of these letters to write a found poem. I blogged about it here.

Since today is Valentine’s Day, I am reposting this love poem.

Come Back, my Love
(after Cecil Lennan, 1925.)

If you come in on the 7:47, bring the bathing suit with you.
And bring back yourself even if you forget all of the above.

Bring back that dark brown hair I love,
the big wavy curl that hangs
continuously over your left eye.

Bring back the eyes looking into mine
telling me you are mine.
Bring back the nose,
your quivering lips–silent.

Bring back the arms that have hugged me
so tightly–a little tighter still, because–
because they wanted to.

Bring back your heart, that electric spark
thrilling my toes, my body to my head
and down again–and again.

Bring back the mystery, the wonder,
the sweetness that is yours.
I will take it all, put my arms around it
all, and hug, and kiss, and love it
for ages and ages.
Will you?
Margaret Simon, found poem (c) 2018