Title TBA

Tomorrow, I will be returning to Herrick’s High School for my third workshop: the second meeting out of six, with seven students, for a project about the Seven Deadly Sins. The participants are required to respond to this workshop through blog posts, and so I thought I would join them in this self-reflective process.  In my thirteen plus years of teaching, I mulled, pondered, ruminated and celebrated my daily interactions with students, but I never wrote about my responses – until now. Reading posts about myself, written by students before they met me, was fascinating, and I wanted them to know this experience two, er, too.  After all, who doesn’t like reading about how one impacts seven or seven ones impact one – or more.

So, impressions of Day 1 on the day before Day 2:  After I introduced the works of Bosch and Bruegel, brainstorming began at various rates of progress: Sarah says, “No hamburger left behind,” after she drew Greed in a bathtub bathing in cash. Shiana, a name I will only remember if I think, ‘See Anna,’ has a few pages of sketches referencing Keith Haring, but which sin will she choose? Febs (Febia) writes on images and leaves them for others to find, much like, I imagine, her design for the boy with too many valentines in his arms. Mairead, who told me her name means Margaret in Gaelic, envisions a flower opening and attracting with a repulsive mechanical inside. Justin, with his name scrawled on masking tape across his mouth, works on plans for Patience keeping Wrath on a short leash. Courtney has a page of half animal/half human puppets dangling on strings but operated by man. Finally, Molly, a writer beyond her years, refers to my “[episadomilogical] lasagna” of an artist statement and gets me thinking that I need to ease up on using big words.

I will aim to use less obtuse verbiage (whoops) but I still have to dabble in word play…the repetition of numbers in paragraph one…not so much in two…

I am excited to return tomorrow and get started with armatures of deadly sins.  Caitlin, number eight, I will meet you then!