Back Up North

We have had a lot of time with the grandkids this past year or so, but we realized that almost all of it was in San Francisco. We think that the last time we visited them in their home town of Portland was for Zadie’s 10^th birthday in November, 2021, when we organized a scavenger hunt for her birthday party. 

 

So it felt like we were overdue for visit to their home town and what better excuse than to see Zadie play basketball on a team she’s been with these past few months. Sitting in the bleachers was yet another trip down the road of her mother’s childhood and mostly delightfully so. Especially since Zadie had her best game of the season, scoring 6 points, assisting other shooters, getting rebounds, blocking shots, stealing the ball— all of which helped lead to the team’s second victory of the season. She hugged us afterwards and confided, “You brought me luck!”

 

If any readers remember my last interaction with Zadie at the end of our Palm Springs vacation in December, it was a low point in our relationship. A full-scale battle between the innocent (mostly) happy girl gleefully playing and loving time in the natural word and the emerging Eminem-fan/ Mortal Kombat playing/ eye-rolling version created by a far-too young puberty. It was a Jekyll and Hyde tour-de-force and thought there were some truly wonderful connections during that visit, it ended on a sour note. So I didn’t know what to expect and will confess that I was nervous headed up this way. While inwardly reminding myself to not take anything personally or react with outrage and to try to understand what was raging inside her too-rapidly-changing body-mind. 

 

When I told her I wanted to come visit her class and sing some songs, as I have done every visit since preschool, she replied, “Oh, my God!! You can’t!! That would embarrass me SO MUCH!!!!” So I had reason to be concerned, while still holding steady to my determination to sing with her class. For three reasons:

 

1) These are the kids I sang with online every week during her 3^rd grade COVID year. They knew me, they learned a certain repertoire of songs and of course, I wanted to sing with them again. 

 

2) Her teacher went to the SF School and both my wife Karen and I taught her for many years. So of course, we wanted to visit HER class. (And she is excited about that!)

 

3) The school is marked as a Social Justice School and the kids deserve to learn the songs that they’re not learning that framed the struggles of the 60’s. And learn the stories behind them. I have at least eight songs ready to go, with a Powerpoint and relevant images. 

 

So… Zadie and I have had a lovely three days, no unexpected explosions or meltdowns, an easy return to our go-to Rummy 500 games and tonight, her fourth Hitchcock film. The first night had a lovely visit with my nephew Ian, yesterday a wonderful brunch with my college friends Gabe and Steve and their three grandchildren, followed by a hike up to the Pittock Mansion and a fun dinner discussing the pluses and minuses of an 11-year old starting to drink coffee. 

Today was basketball with her and her brother Malik, a bus ride and walk to Hawthorne Street, a lunch out at Cha Cha Cha, a visit to Powell’s bookstore and buying books for both her and Malik and a delicious quiet time reading and drawing that just now ended. 

 

When the school visit comes up, there’s a little squeak of protest, but I believe she has accepted it. I’ll let you know tomorrow. 

 

As for Portland, it’s cold (40’s) and grey and we passed a disturbing apartment building with a big sign: “ARMED TENANTS. STEAL GAS-GET SHOT” and equally disturbing tent-city of homeless folks downtown. And yet lovely parks (Laurelhurst!), wonderful people (lots of friends here) and when the sun comes out, it’s glorious. 

 

The kids are released from their quiet time and the “STOPS!” have begun. And so I will.  

Hit the Damn Ball!!!

I often think of a W.C. Fields short I saw in college. He’s pretending to know something about golf and teach a young lady and steps up to the ball preparing to tee off. For some ten minutes, all these little things interfere just as he’s about to hit it. As a viewer, you’re waiting for him to hit the damn ball, each minute that passes adding to your building frustration— and he never does! 

 

Such a simple premise. When you expect an action to be completed —even something as simple as hitting a golf ball— and it never does, it is maddening. And each time it gets close and then turns away, your exasperation increases. Take ten minutes to watch this clip and you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. (The whole thing is 20 minutes, but you can fast forward through the first ten or so and begin at the golf lesson):  

 

https://youtu.be/aIkUZ7CwqVo

 

This is the perfect metaphor for the snail-like grinding wheels of justice for the criminal acts of the Teflon ex-President. From Stormy Daniels to the Muller Report to the first impeachment to the second impeachment to the January 6^thcall for insurrection to the call to Georgia to New York back taxes and yet more and yet more, why is this guy still walking around outside of a jail cell? Each time the club swings back and is about to finally hit the ball, something else impedes its completion. Not only is the guy still walking freely, but he gets to announce his return bid for the 2024 election. While thousands of black men are incarcerated for the skimpiest of offenses and dubious proofs and sentences far beyond the seriousness of their crimes, this one and his cronies evade the deserved swing of the club.

 

This, of course, is not an accident, but the logical outcome of our twisted history of privilege and white supremacy. And yet embedded in the system is the potential of actual justice, the thwarted laws that say out loud that all are accountable, despite the clear fact that so many are not. This is a step above “Yep. We’re allowed to do whatever we want, so no point even trying to bring us down.” 

 

Still though, after all the hopes that the investigations would actually lead to right action deferred time and time again, it is exhausting and dispiriting. Yet still, I keep watching W.C. Fields about to hit the ball, in hopes that someday he will.

The Music Education of the Future

Four years ago, before the world had changed forever, I wrote this on a Facebook Post. It holds up.

 

Walked through the streets of Singapore on Sunday hearing Hindu chants, Muslim calls to prayer, Christian church choirs, Buddhist intonations. Inside the synagogue, the Jewish cantors were singing, in another building, a Balinese gamelan was rehearsing and the next day, my class of teachers were joyfully playing Step Back Baby on their way to the blues. All the many facets of our common Divine Spirit were alive and vibrant and not a single vibration was claiming itself as the only true and worthy one. Amidst all the shameful shouting and posturing and toddler-tantrum demanding of taxpayers money to fuel yet more division with the Wall, we need to realize that the wall has already been built, in the sense that Duke Ellington said long ago:

 

"Of all the walls, the tallest, most invisible, and most insidious… is the wall of prejudice."

 

The mandate of our times is to fight the battle of Jericho, play the trumpets—and sitars and djembes and Bulgarian bagpipes—that will make those walls come tumblin’ down. Let that be the mandate of the music education of the future!

  

True

Having written three posts with the word “True,” it seems like a good idea to define the term. Especially in these days of “If I believe it, it’s true.”

 

The Latin root is ver and we can find it in words like “verdict, veracity, verify, verity and verdad” (in Spanish). One definition includes the word “very,” saying that when something is very good, it’s “truly” good. “True” is also a verb, as in “bringing an object or wheel into the exact shape, alignment or position required.” And isn’t that a lovely notion of the importance of truth, bringing things into alignment with what’s needed. 

 

Where else does “true” turn up? I discovered this:

 

True color is an RGB color model standard that specifies 256 shades for red, green and blue spaces, totaling 16 million colors, much more than what the human eye can distinguish, which is only 10 million colors.

 

Not clear what this means and neither does my art teacher/ artist wife, but I like the idea that truth is never a single color, but a nuanced version of reality with many shades. 16 million, according to the above!

 

But my wife reminded me of the term “true blue” and its apparent origin in 1636 dates it long before the rise of the Democratic Party (without any details that I can find). This meaning of “unswerving loyalty to a political party” is much less appealing. We have had far too much of that!

 

True also means being faithful, as in not cheating on your lover or holding fast to an ideal. 

 

Finally, true in its most basic definition means aligned with actual fact, something that is currently too far out of fashion. And this fact is true— I have three classes ahead of me today and no more time to investigate truth further. Happy Friday!

True Character

Lessons sometimes come from unusual places. Like the words of the fictional Inspector Gamache in Louise Penny’s various mystery novels like Still Life and A Fatal Grace. At one point in the former, he shares the four most important phrases that lead us to wisdom:

 

1) I don’t know.

2) I need help.

3) I’m sorry.

4) I was wrong.

 

Brief commentary:

1) I don’t know: And I know I don’t know it. And I feel no shame about it, unless it’s something I should have known and refused to do the work. And since I don’t know it, that leads me to number 2.

 

2) I need help: That’s what plumbers, computer technicians, car mechanics, therapists, friends, etc. are for. If I know what I don’t know and what I need to know, I’ll either learn it or will look for someone who does. If someone asks me to write the definitive article on movement in Orff Schulwerk, I could fake it, but why? Simply pass it on to brilliant Orff Schulwerk dance teachers I know. The follow-up question to “I need help,” is “from whom?” And then ask. 

 

3) I’m sorry. We all cast a shadow in this life and end up hurting, disappointing, insulting, betraying at least some of the many people who cross our paths. (Or all the people at least some of the time?) Whether it be from ignorant remarks, self-defense or purposeful malice, “I’m sorry” is the courageous response that let’s folks know that perhaps we’ve learned something, eaten some of the blame and asked for forgiveness.

 

4) I was wrong. Winston Churchill famously said “ I have had to eat my own words many times and I find it a very nourishing diet.” This is the more muscular version of “I’m sorry” and can lead to the same kind of self-forgiveness and healing of shame that we all could use more of. Gamache also mentions a variant, “I might be wrong, but…” and I love the way that this doesn’t negate one’s firm convictions in the truth you feel you’re telling, but leaves just enough of a sliver of doubt that another’s contrary truth can enter the conversation. It takes the talk one step down from the arrogance that halts discussion. 

 

As any reader of my own words well knows, I often feel compelled to carry these brilliant thoughts beyond just one’s own growth into the discourse of our time. If I mention names and their corresponding political party, that can be a conversation-stopper, but why beat around the bush? Or better yet, see the movie Where’s My Roy Cohn? about the man who wrote the modern-day Machiavellian playbook that defines some of our current national character. His anti-Gamache advice?  

 

1) Think you know it all. Act as if you know something about the things you know absolutely nothing about. Never, ever, admit you don’t know something. That’s weak.

 

2) Never ask for help. It’s weak.

 

3) Never, ever say you’re sorry. It’s weak to admit that you made a mistake or hurt somebody. 

 

4) Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever say you’re wrong. It’s weak and it will be used against you in court.

 

Connect the dots, my friends. The true divide in this country is not Right against Left but two contrary opinions on what constitutes strength and courage and what shows cowardice and weakness. In my world, vulnerability is strength and all of Gamache’s four pillars require courage. They are the things that bring us to our true character. 

In the other world, I see nothing but weak cowards hiding behind denial, lies, refusal to face both the flaws and the potential goodness in their character. How can we hold a meaningful conversation across that divide?

 

I’m sorry I don’t know how to say this better. Though I might be wrong, I could use some help.  

True Democracy

Today Facebook shared back to me a post from this day six years ago. Having just written 

a post about true teaching, seems serendipitous to re-post something about true democracy. And so here it is.

 

TRUE DEMOCRACY

© 2017 Doug Goodkin

 

A Spring day in February in Golden Gate Park. 

 

The sun emerged after five days of constant rain without

a single person voting for it.

 

The Congress of trees met and the plums, a clear minority,

spoke their piece in pink fragrant blossoms without the others shutting them down.

 

No dam Cabinet leader blocked the flow of the gurgling stream nor shouted to drown out its merry burbling song. 

 

No one insulted the pink bulbs beginning to open or foreclosed the homes of the nesting birds or banned the bees from entering the flower. 

 

No one claimed that Spring didn’t really exist or built a wall to keep out the migrating winged creatures. 

 

On a Spring day in February in Golden Gate Park,

True democracy prevailed. 

True Teaching

“Do as I say, not as I do” was one of the more stupid aphorisms adults in my childhood liked to say. Even as a kid, I could feel the hypocrisy of them trying to excuse their dubious behavior while demanding something better from me. 

 

And yet, as teachers, don’t we sometimes carry on a version of this? Be honest here. How many times do we tell the kids, “Behave!/ Do a better job! / Sing better! / Feel the beat!” without giving them a single clue as to how to actually do those things? How many times has someone told us, “Relax!” or “Calm down!” and how many times did that actually help us to relax or calm down?

 

So the true teacher has to think deeper about how to lead the students to the desired result. We have to give them an embodied experience that gives them both the tools and the pleasure of doing something well or better. If we want them to relax, some stretching and breathing exercises can help. If we want to sing better, it’s our job to understand how to do that. To do some echo singing, for example, and when a kid sings back too low, to sing it again starting at the kid’s pitch and then raising it up one half-step at a time. If they’re having trouble internalizing beat, why, there are a hundred strategies of patting the beat, walking the beat, gently tapping the beat on their back, always with a song to tie it together. And then the many beat-passing games where getting off the beat means getting out (temporarily) from the game and upping the motivation. 

 

One of the talks I give to kids (elaborated in Chapter 7 of my Teach Like It’s Music book) is about music class as the place to learn two essential things: How to Blend In/ How to Stand Out. The kids quickly perceive that these are apparent opposites, but the punchline is to learn which of the two an activity calls for. I then demonstrate with a concrete example of everyone singing Twinkle Little Starand me singing with them, but off key. Then in a different tempo. Then with different words. Then louder than everyone else. In each case, I show how just one person singing poorly can destroy the beauty of 25 kids singing perfectly in tune and in time. 

So singing is the time to blend in and if you’re singing badly on purpose, we need to have a little private talk about your obligation to both the group and yourself. If you’re singing poorly because you have trouble with pitch or beat, then it’s our job together to get better at both through all the efforts and strategies available. And then when you’re really singing well, why, perhaps you can sing a solo— the perfect moment to stand out!

 

So even though my colleague/mentee and I gave that talk to one of the four 5^th/6^thgrade groups we’re teaching, even with that example, he reported back that they’re having trouble achieving a harmonious group energy. As a teacher, I can sigh and complain about kids today, the horrible models of human beings they see in the news, the confusion parents show in child-raising, the addiction to video-games and social media, the canary-in-the-mine ways in which kids are reflecting a world in chaos. All of which may be true. But so what? The kids still are walking into the classroom. How can we help them?

 

As reported recently, I had a success story with one child where the activity broke through the wall that my words kept bouncing off of and we both left the class refreshed. So the challenge tomorrow is to choose fun, relevant activities that can help create a joyful working group energy while still holding the disrupters accountable, hopefully convincing them that it will be more fun and satisfying to do things well than foolish. That’s what I signed up for when I stumbled into this worthy and glorious and supremely difficult endeavor called teaching. That’s what a true teacher does. 

 

I’ll let you know how it goes.