Hermitage by Paul Klee, 1918
Year three. Here we go again, venturing out to see on the Good Ship Colorforms.
Weeks came and went, but still no words came from the Honorable MS.
We sat in close visual proximity but not next to each other like year two.
One day the kids informed me that he indeed could speak; he just didn't speak to me.
I gave up.
No, I couldn't.
Still determined to engage him, once more I walked past and made a comment on his beautiful art. He answered.
Running to my chair, I clutched its arms, pulling myself into the seat before I hit ground. Everyone looked up in joyful anticipation of a faint.
Fainting spells, though fake, were the one booty guaranteed to sway the crew of this ship, even the most surly of sailors. Having been overplied with sweets, toys, chits and stars, what they craved most was drama, and plenty of it.
I had ended promises to faint after realizing I had become a freak in a sideshow of my own design. Resigned to stop the madness, my ears now rung with the chants of children begging me to hit dirt. It's one way to make a living and besides, falling to the floor is an art in itself. This is one of a million techniques you don't learn in methods class.
Finally they figured I was not taking the dive and asked what happened.
"MS talked to me."
From that day on, we exchanged brief sentences and even had quasi-conversations now and again. This was progress.
Death and Fire by Paul Klee, 1940
Late in the year, all hands on deck, we were almost finished reading a biography of Paul Klee. Although a kid-version bio, this book thankfully does not avoid truth, including a couple of works Klee completed just prior to his death in 1940.
Kids don't need language to get life through art. They read symbols depicting depression, oppression, sickness, war and death like nobody's business. An intense, kid-propelled discussion began on the Nazis: their impact on history, artists, Jews, and all other thinking, feeling people.
Despite their behavior on schoolbuses, there is nothing that incenses children more than meanness and injustice when viewed from a third-party perspective. This fact gives me hope for the world. They see no logic in round green colorforms beating up on square red ones. Can't they all just make beautiful pictures together?
Class was almost done. We clustered around the book. MS raised his hand and waited patiently to speak. The rowdy crew became silent. He embarked in lengthy detail on a graduate-level description of Hitler's effect on the world and the implications of the holocaust.
My mouth fell open as I stared at the new commander of the ship
and realized mutiny is moot in the face of truth.
Finally I managed, "How do you know all that?"
He said, "Those are the books I like to read."
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