jumpingfish

#silentsunday

First day after Spring Break.

They have a test on Wednesday, so they’re reviewing today and tomorrow. The room is quiet with a murmur of some of them working together, leaning over the worksheet, sharing the Desmos graphs of the functions they’re studying. 

There’s a picture of our campsite at Ratcliff Lake in the Davy Crockett National forest on the monitor at the front of the room just to the left of a student’s rendering of my mother chasing her boys with a wooden spoon in her hand, a story which seems to have sunk in with at least one of them.

There are three boys chatting up some non-math chat on the other side of the room, as these three often do. But hey, it’s the first day back. No need for me to harass them. The test will be the ultimate judge. 

Years ago the fair and industrious Trudy gave me a Giant Spiderwort on my birthday. 

“How long ago was that?” I periodically ask her.

“Oh. I don’t know, a long time ago,” she says, drawing out the word long. We find ourselves reflecting on time this way frequently. Fugit irreparabile tempus.

In March each year, her generosity returns. And here we are.

The Spiderwort has spread. The yard is a purple splendor that glows in the morning light.

Last night was teacher appreciation night for the girls soccer teams. One varsity and two JV girls evidently appreciate Algebra 2 despite the challenges. They invited me to the pre-game ceremonies after school — JV at 5:00, varsity at 7:30. I typically leave home at 7:00am. And so with the 30 minute drive home included, that means it was a long day.

The girls gave us personalized mini-soccer balls, annotated in various unique ways, most with colorful designs, some with math puns. And we got to go out on the field with them before the game started where they introduced us as each girl’s name and number were announced to the fans in the stands.

It might have been a long day, but I got three mini-soccer balls out of it. I’ll take the trade.

We devoured the Narnia books, my brother and I, when we were young. My aunt had given them to all four cousins. My brother read them faster than the rest of us. That was years ago. Of all the wonder in those books, two images remain strikingly vivid.

1. Lily Pads

At the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Reepicheep climbed over the side of the ship to a rowboat. The ship could go no further, so he rowed alone toward the rim of the world. The surface of the water was green with lily pads extending to the horizon.

Once upon a time during a summer in Michigan, we paddled a canoe thru what felt like an infinite expanse of lily pads. We pulled hard on our paddles, barely making forward progress to what in a way was the end of our world where the lake water ran over a small dam down to Cooper Creek. Our canoe would go no further.

In the summer, they spray herbicides on the lake to counter the algae blooms that come from fertilized lawn runoff, herbicides that kill the algae and the lily pads and anything else green. I wonder about the far end of the lake where the lily pads used to thrive. I wonder what it will look like when summer comes. 

Last year, they seemed better than the year before. Perhaps the men in hazmat suits throttled their spraying. That gives me solace, and I look forward to the lake this summer.

2. Burnt Civilization

In The Magician’s Nephew, upon stepping into a pool in the wood between the worlds, Digory and Polly found themselves in an empty city. There was only a pathetic queen alone in the emptiness beneath a dim glow of a dying sun, a place whose time was over. The silent desolation haunts me to this day.

And then I stop to think about what this place will be like as the planet broils, whether it be from changing climate or an end-of-life sun much later. I wonder what it will be like for the last of us to linger. What will it be like to remain as Earth nears its end? As the rivers run dry. As the rains stop. As the heat soars. I try to imagine what I would do, and then I think that we are doing it.

We are doing it, you and I. You with your lovingly tended tomatoes and broccoli bursting forth and the other seeds waiting to germinate in the safety of the shelter you provide them. Me with my sticks and piles of wood and other hidey-holes where leaves might stay damp and the little creatures find refuge from the heat. We are doing it. And it gives me solace, and I look forward the fruits of our labor this spring.