My aunt visited Vermont while I was staying at her house in Richmond, MA this week and came home praising the spot where I-91 leaves Massachusetts and finds its way winding through hilly southern Vermont. I feel my shoulder blades sink deep as I pass this spot today, leaving the Berkshires for my Springfield heartspot. I leave something good down here in the rural, picturesque towns of Sheffield and New Marlborough and feel myself smiling thinking of little bodies jumping from one array to the next as 2nd graders dip their toes into multiplication and the challenge of finding the biggest foot in a group of fifth graders to make me the largest possible area to dance in during math.
I have been treated well by these teachers, students, and Jane of Flying Cloud who is so obviously in love with living, breathing, realizing integration of arts and other curricular subjects. I found myself sitting around mini elementary school tables again, debriefing with teachers about their experiences dancing math with me and their students, and talking about how to improve my practice, develop ideas further, and what it means to be 9 and a student these days. You would never know that the end of school is right around the corner the way these folks talk about the learning and doing that is happening in their classrooms. For a moment, it feels like September when the possibilities for what will happen in school this year are rich and overwhelming.
But I cross state lines and look forward to the summer season as the lushness that is my home state envelops me and says, "Welcome home."
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