A Hunt for Delights

In 2022, I read The Book of Delights by Ross Gay. It was my evangelical book of the year (I could not stop talking about it!). I reviewed it here, but basically he is a poet who decided that he was going to write about a delight a day, every day, starting on his birthday and ending on his next birthday. (He admits that was ambitious, he did skip a bunch of days throughout the year.) The other thing is that he had to handwrite the delights and write them quickly. 

I loved this book, and loved the concept behind the book even more. And, percolating in the back of my mind was an idea to use it in the classroom. 

So, in this new year, I decided to do two weeks of delights with my self contained 7th grade English class. I flagged some more appropriate "essayettes" as he calls them, and read the preface and two of the delights. There were so many I wanted to read, but they had too much swearing and a little sauciness that wouldn't be the best in the classroom. 

I found these little paperboard journals that I'd purchased for a club, and I had exactly the right amount to give one to each student, me, and the teacher's assistant. Today, we looked at some examples of my delights, and decorated the covers of the journals. Their homework was to brainstorm a list of possible delights to look for, knowing that sometimes delights find YOU. Tomorrow, we start a delight a day. 

My thought is that we all find a delight each day to chronicle on a page in the journal, and then we'll share our delights at the start of class. I'll weave some figurative language in for the describing, and then we'll pick a couple delights over the course of the two weeks to turn into more finished writing pieces through the editing and revising process. 

I am so stinking proud of this idea. The world is super yucky right now, and it's the dark, cold, dead of winter, so who couldn't use a hunt for and meditation on delights? 

The icicles and full moon made my bathroom window look like it had teeth.

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The first batch of flower/seed catalogs to get me dreaming of spring.

Over the break we reorganized the coat closet, and these clear plastic drawer boxes brought me a tremendous amount of delight because now I can SEE everything! 

We reorganized the craft room/guest room/puzzle room/soon-to-be-musical-instrument room, and while the number of puzzles I have is kind of embarrassing, now all my supplies are in one place in the closet and it is soooooo satisfying to look at. 

This was NOT a delight when I saw it the first time, but it IS a delight because it's a giant plastic bee that Bryce loves to hide in weird places (in the bed, in the refrigerator, etc) and it's ridiculous childish fun.

And this oldie but goodie, a rogue pansy that sprouted form the gross pavers of our old house's stoop, that was perfectly in tandem with one of Ross Gay's delights about a flower growing up out of a curb.