MindSpinner

A couple of months back, the family movie (a ritual fading to rarity these days) was indeed Donnie Darko. It was dark, weird, intriguing and compelling - definitely worth watching, probably twice because once isn’t enough to enable you to put all the pieces together and make sense of them.

My kids downloaded one song from its soundtrack, called “Mad World,” written by Gary Jules and performed by Tears for Fears. It’s a haunting song. There’s a certain age at which thoughtful teenagers come to see through institutions and absurdities and shrewdly assess what the future holds for them in the world as we’ve made it; moreover they come to recognize that institutions and absurdities (all too often being one and the same) frequently do not value them for the unique individuals that they are but only reward or dismiss them according to how well they measure up to expectations. They struggle to find psychologically safe and supportive places in which they can work out who they are and who they wish to become. This song reminds me of how rare those places can be and of how often school fails to be one of them. We’re so busy making students conformable to and functional in this world so that they can succeed in it that we can miss meeting them, knowing them, and valuing them for the inner lives that they lead. It’s those inner selves that need to breath in order to make their lives worth living.

Mad World

Verse
All around me are familiar faces
Worn out places, Worn out faces
Bright and early for the daily races
Going nowhere, Going nowhere
Their tears are filling up their glasses
No expression, No expression
Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow
No tomorrow, No tomorrow

Chorus
And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad
These dreams in which I’m dying, Are the best I’ve ever had
I find it hard to tell you, I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it’s a very very
Mad World, Mad World

Verse
Children waiting for the day they feel good
Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday
And they feel the way that every child should
Sit and listen, Sit and listen
Went to school and I was very nervous
No one knew me, No one knew me
Hello teacher tell me what’s my lesson
Look right through me, Look right through me

Chorus
And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad
These dreams in which I’m dying, Are the best I’ve ever had
I find it hard to tell you, I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it’s a very very
Mad World, Mad World

I’ve done it, you see, muddled through a hectic day and looked right through them, talked at them, processed their papers, thinking the day’s lesson was my object. What they needed most of all from me is that I should come to know them and to bring them lessons that can help them to live - to live deeply and authentically in an admittedly mad world (not forgetting that they have much to teach me). I can’t bring them anything worth having if I’ve forgotten how to live deeply and authentically myself. The other stuff will have its meaning and worth only if we begin with this. What strikes me with equal force is that the same is true for parenting as for teaching.

I’ve resolved to renew a promise every day, “I will not look right through you. I will know and value you instead.”  Even when there’s a yearbook deadline and grades are due and stacks of papers pile up.