Talking Doesn’t Solve Anything

Good ideas need to be put into action

They were the wild ones, kids who didn’t listen When droning lulled curious minds into stupor. For them, the page before them was a blank canvas Begging for scribbles of lyrics and squiggles of blue Spiraling tumbles around the corners, up the sides, Small focused ones so intent on creation others woke To pens in grubby fists, rough paper shadowed By time worn desktops gouged by drifting minds In long-gone times when baseball was everything. Screens guarded summer windows and phones Channeled messages when someone beloved died.

Sunlight drew day’s passing with long, hot beams. Edging slowly from the front to the back of the classroom, Bright glare muted to a golden glow when release came. The playground offered rusty swings strong enough To hold teachers when they remembered who they were At heart and played disguised as wrinkled, old kids Closing their eyes and pumping their feet until they flew Like the birds pecking under little kid picnic tables Now that kindergarteners have been herded inside So the proper order of things can be restored: Cool kids and everyone else can take their places as

Who they need to be, put impulse into action, Racing and laughing, needing no explanation or calculation, Commanding, demanding, be-a-good-student-or-else Horrible and terrible will be your fate, so do as I say. What if you let go and flipped upside down? Why can’t a zebra take its stripes to a tiger saunter? Why did that bee hide in the book and sting Jon? If you close your eyes and spin really fast in circles, You’ll fall down and the world will keep spinning. Did Newton invent a perpetual motion machine? Or was that some other dead guy a long time ago?

I overheard little girls talking on the playground.

They were debating merits and possibilities, negotiating terms of agreement for an enterprise.

Then they saw me.

Articulate went dumb. Faces softened, bellies rounded. They swayed in place, talking about Barbie dolls and movie princesses.

And I’m the cool grown-up.

It’s safe to tell me things, because I take whatever you say seriously.

I don’t care if you’re five or ninety-five.

I will listen.

These school-addled kids didn’t know me.

It was safer to be that blank slate desperate for adult instruction, the words that would prompt questions sounding like kids were listening rather than distracting the teacher into forgetting the lesson plan and doing something.

The best teacher I ever had — and I’ve been blessed with many — was a 7th grade homeroom teacher named Mr. Ower.

Proud to have arrived in the United States and quickly become qualified to teach middle school children in New Jersey, Per Einar Ower loved us enough to be real with us.

He spoke to us as if he were talking with adults, people he respected and was truly interested in hearing from.

When we studied American history in our Revolutionary War town, we found ourselves making pudding over campfires and doing a living history museum presentation to our parents.

When we dared to bring up the idea of a class trip that we wanted to do, we got to go camping in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey rather than pile onto buses to museums and sanctioned sites.

We raised the money for what we would need, figured out logistics, food, supplies, and all we needed for a long, glorious weekend of hiking, campfires, and telling ghost stories that scared us so badly that no one slept.

That might also have been due to other factors, such as the midnight roaming, the kid who walked into a tree and screamed, and the candy and chips enjoyed all night long.

From Mr. Ower, we learned that if you have an idea and you research it, you can bring it to life.

Kids did crazy science experiments that worked and are probably illegal in fifteen different ways in our current cautious idiot times.

Some of us wrote plays we put on for the lower grades.

No one told us what to do, how to think, or that books and studying were the only answers.

Books and studying were resources to help us achieve the great things twelve-year-olds come up with when you get out of their way and let them do what comes naturally: learning, talking, and doing.