Digestion, a lesson

Over breakfast, peaches and cream made with farm fresh peaches we got from the farmers on a family walk last night, we started talking about digestion. It mapped out our whole day.

Fair really likes peaches, and coupled with her excitement to start homeschooling, she was really digging through her food, hoping that we could get started with the school aspect of her day. I asked her to slow down and told her that she needs to let her food digest, something parents have said to me for years, and I never really cared about what it meant, I just wanted to get and go! "No swimming after you eat, let your food digest, you could get cramps and die!" (Then how do fish ever eat I would ask.) Now I am bringing down the senseless hammer of "because I said so" to my children. "Anyway, what is digest dad?", pipes in Whitman. I am forced to explain to my children how poop is made, but know that it won't fly, and would be missing it all, the whole lesson, the whole point of it all.

"Well, digestion is the process our bodies go through to turn food into energy." Eyes light up, they love energy. "Our bodies are like any other machine that needs fuel, and our fuel is food. the better the food we eat, the better our energy is, and like wise, the worse the food we eat, the worse we will feel." They are getting it, I can see it, and they start throwing out examples of good food versus bad food. After shooting down the great good candy theory of Whitman's for the third time, we start talking about our goals for the day. I grab a pad of paper and jot down our first idea, a blog. Okay, so it was my idea, but they liked it, especially when asked what a blog was and I said "a sort of digest of our lives", they snapped it together. "Our bodies, and our minds both need food, and when we learn information, it digests and turns into knowledge." This is coming from Fair, the 5 year old. "yeah, so the blog is where our brain poops. " Yes, Whitman, exactly.

Really though, this lesson is huge. How much time do we take each day to slow down and digest? Growing up without cell phones, I could have told you every kid in my class' phone number from memory (half because i prank called them so much) and now some of us have to check our phones for OUR OWN number. This automation of life has taken serious consequence in our bodies. We are unhealthier now than ever before, and we live in the most abundant period of human history, if you buy products as abundance (clearly it is not!), and yet we are cramping up in the pool of our days. We have the most open source information gathering tools in the world, not mention the world itself having 6 billion people with 7 billion life stories (i had to double up on the life stories for all the lying politicians and closeted priests who live double lives), and yet we are more disconnected now than ever in my lifetime. It is simple really. We are not digesting properly, and what we are digesting, is low quality, prepackaged garbage. From our food, to our information, our communication to our dreamlife, we have accepted and then become mediocre at best.

Well, we talked all about digestion while we made this blog together, getting consensus on every aspect of it, from the name to the color scheme to the photo we use and the words I write, all of it is together, or not at all. We decided to clean the house a little, and especially our space we would use for learning, because you eat better on an empty stomach and you learn better with a clear space and a clear mind. We found some old playing cards we decided to turn into a poster of numbers, rather than just throw them away. Collaged that, then did some yoga stretching and breathing, watched a pbs Nature show about skunks, made lunch, played on the scooters in the parking lot (which was a lot of fun and a big reminder what 30 years old means) climbed a tree, found a baby bird nest, decided to draw some pics of the nest in the tree, read a book about the structure of bee life and took a nap. The best part of it was, I never once said "okay, let's get serious, focus here, this is school it is important stuff."

Well, thanks for reading and I hope you like our brain poop.

If you are interested, last night I interviewed John Taylor Gatto on my radio show. He is a big whistle blower on the design of our school system to be oppressive and make weak kids who are submissive.

The end of schooling, the beginning of education.

Today we begin on a journey. No. That is all wrong. Today we continue the journey of life, uninterrupted. Today is our first day out of school. Let's lay this out, bit by bit.

The Franklin family, in the traditional sense, is comprised of a mother, Angela, a father, Michael, a daughter aged 5, Fair Ophelia, a son, aged 3 named Whitman St. Morgan, and a rough and tumble puppy named Gogol. The Franklin family, in our eyes, and in our hearts is a vast network of beloved people, and every tree we climb, plant we take fruit of, and cloud we see rabbits in. We are kin to the musicians who strum the sound of sorrow and joy, the poets who break the gates of heaven, the painters that steal the colors of the birds of paradise. We are livers and lovers of life.

Recently, Fair became of school age. This spelled out some pretty obvious and some oblivious obstacles, or rather, challenges. Do we enlist her in the state sponsored school compound? Do we shell out more money than we make for specialized school? Do we home-school? Obviously we chose the last, but not initially. We chose to enlist Fair in school. Notice I say enlist, not enroll. We will get that later.

Fair spent exactly 8 days in school, a total of 60 hours, with 4 hours of "free" time in those 60 hours, which included recess and lunch. That is a half an hour every day to perform two of the most important tasks of our day. Playing and eating. Notice that it mimics the 8 hour work day? This is not what we wanted, not what we believe in and not what we were going to do anymore.

On top of this regimented soldier curriculum, another great tragedy was unfolding. Fair and Whitman were separated for the first time ever. The two kids who were best friends (and of course, at times, worst enemies), the kids that taught and learned so much from each other, the kids that were a team of adventurers and spies and detectives and pirates together, were taken away from each other, and all so Fair could be stuck in a room with a stranger, coloring frog pictures. No good, and no thanks.

"I would prefer not to." - Bartelby the Schrivener

Now Fair is here, with her family. We have begun to home-school, and not just Fair, but also Whitman, and ourselves. We are on a grand adventure, where all of life is our teacher and there is no wrong answer, just different paths. This blog is our digest, our catalogue of turning food into energy. Let's see where this will take us.