Homeschool, tree climbing and John Tradescant.
In 2015 I home schooled my son. We set of joyfully like travellers without a map, into unknown waters. We revelled at the freedom of in being in the Autumn sunshine within school hours. I wanted him to experience something of the sense of freedom and joy that following your own creative path brings. He and I looked for it, in leaves and closely inspected insects, in treetops and empty beaches, in history and stories. Often we would sit in companionable silence he in a treetop and me on the ground. We climbed a lot of trees - almost every kind - trees that would have been acorns in the time of the Plague and the Great Fire of London, Horse Chestnut trees that would have been prized conkers in the time of John Tradescant. We imagined him setting out on his ship and then in a tiny old fashioned shop, we found a perfumier with a story of such a ship - with scents of tar and tobacco, oranges and sailcloth and salt. We were explorers and timetravellers, outside the bounds of school time.
It was by no means all easy - these were the good bits, memory is already editing out the boredom and frustration we both at times felt, the weight of responsibility and the overwhelming intensity for me of being together all the time.
But I found something I scribbled on a page at the beginning, before all of that.
Small things
your bare feet
dancing in praise
of the dew soaked grass.
The only child here
free
at 9.30am.
My gift to you.
The day unfolds with no limit on our time.
We are are at sea in a homemade boat
you are a seasoned at joy but I am adjusting
to the motion of the waves and the bright light.
Taking joy like sips of water -
We eat dry biscuits and scour the horizon for somewhere to land
leave our thoughts as prints to follow
Making the map.
There is no hoard
but tiny fragments
of gold
scatterred though every idea.
This freedom feels immense.