let’s try things out
In the open knowledge seminars at BMCC this June, we asked participants to write their four-word pedagogy, and I wrote my own: Let’s try things out. This experimental approach to teaching and learning comes from my years as a student and teacher in The Writers Studio. “Don’t worry about success or failure!” I frequently told my students. Easier said than done, of course. But this is the way.
These words were on my mind on Wednesday morning as I walked up West Broadway and Broadway to the Canal Street subway station. I saw the haze clouding my view of the midtown skyscrapers (more wildfire smoke, I think) and snapped a photograph. And then I kept seeing more that I wanted to photograph. Could I make a decent picture from what I was seeing? Dunno, let’s try it out . . .
Not to get too meta (I hope), but this post is itself an experiment, an attempt to get unstuck. I have a library book on my desk that’s two weeks overdue because I have yet to finish a post that is in part about that book. Maybe if I write this post (mainly composed of pictures), I’ll be able to write that other post? Dunno, let’s try it out.
If you are in New York City or nearby, please join me at 4pm on Saturday, July 29 at Della, at 1238 Prospect Avenue in Brooklyn, for a reading celebrating the publication of my chapbook, Only Provisional. Hani Omar Khalil and Sean Sutherland—both wonderful writers and old friends—will also be reading.
