At Andalusia, with the young people of Project Flow and Aqua Squad

Indeed, it was hot. Indeed there was more water percolating up from our own skin than flowing past in the Delaware River beyond. But for three hours yesterday afternoon, at the gorgeous historic Biddle estate, Andalusia, I had the great pleasure of working with the young environmentalists and active citizens of the Fairmount Water Works' Project Flow as well as the teens of the Texas Aqua Squad.

Together we explored the grounds, hunted for magic, metaphor, and simile, collected turkey feathers, studied a recreated grapery, discovered portraits of George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte, searched for colors, listened to the 1886 words of Biddle's Aunt Kitty, pondered departures and returns, and interviewed one another.

To those who spoke as shadows, the color red, the everything of green, an albino snake, and so much more, to those who listened to their partners so well that they could tell their stories for them, to those who said I can't and then discovered I can, thank you.

Let's be weird together. Always.

(With thanks to Ellen Schultz and Connie Griffith Houchins.)

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Teaching the Teachers FLOW as part of the William Penn Foundation funded education program

Last year I shared the extraordinary news that my river autobiography, Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River, was selected as a core element in a William Penn Foundation-funded program designed "to improve environmental education in Philadelphia middle schools."

The first sweep of teachers is now meeting every Saturday morning at the Water Works (pictured above) to build the sweeping curriculum that will change the way children learn in my city. This morning, I'm joining my dear friend Adam Levine there on site to contribute to this program. Adam will be sharing his huge knowledge of secret city water ways and streams that have become sewers. I'll be teaching the teachers how to teach Flow, giving them writing exercises and critiquing ideas.


And so into the frosty cold we go....

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My Life's Work, My Actual Calling: Project FLOW at the Water Works and in the Inquirer

We reach a certain juncture in life and we realize that there's only so much time left to us now. We look back and ask, Have we done enough, loved enough, been enough? We look ahead and ask, What now?

I have always been real with myself; I have known the me within. What are my passions? Children and stories. What have I done? Raised a son I love more than any story can tell and written books that a handful of kind souls have read. I've been flat-out lucky to publish as many books as I have. I've been unimaginably blessed to be given the chance to take my stories into classrooms and into the open hearts of the young. I learn from them, again and again. Frankly, I love them.

Two Tuesdays ago I taught at a multi-week camp for young scientists and activists at the Fairmount Water Works. The camp is called Project FLOW. My privilege is to get the children thinking and writing about the soul of the river, akin to my own work in Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River (Temple University Press). Kevin Ferris and the Inquirer team made the moment even brighter by agreeing to publish my photo essay (which includes the work of the young people) about that morning.

The link to the story is now live and can be found here. A few more photos from last week's post are here.

In the meantime, below, all of the children of the 2014 Project FLOW. Here they are listening to Sashoya read from her brilliant river creation myth.

Finally, thanks to my friend, the poet Kate Northrop, whose poem "Things Are Disappearing Here" got us all started.

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Project Flow at the Water Works: Did I love them? Oh yes, I loved them. But more on all that soon.

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when it is time again to teach I turn to the poets

and, always, there, I find what I didn't know I was searching for.

In the dark hours of this cloudy day, just ahead of the morning I will spend with the seventh graders of Project Flow at Philadelphia's Water Works, I turned to Kate Northrop, Stanley Kunitz, Seamus Heaney, Mary Oliver, Ted Kooser, and Greg Djanikian and found:

* a title that leads me toward a game
* a scene that leads me toward a prompt
* a pair of divine metaphors
* a myth that will inspire myths

Whoever thinks poetry is superfluous has not spent a morning with children.

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Philadelphia in Pictures: Paine's Park, Boathouse Row, Water Works, Project Flow

I go nowhere without one of my cameras, and so, on Thursday, as I made my way to my morning of chilling with the teen writers of Project Flow, I stopped along the Schuylkill Banks and snapped a few shots. They capture the heat and color of the day.

That's Paine's Park up there, the brand-new skateboard park that sort of blew me away with its size and sweep; that's the Philadelphia Art Museum in the background. My friend Mike rides the curves of this park every weekend morning. I could have sat and watched for hours.

And then the Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center and then a sneaky shot of Cira Centre. Cira is a Cesar Pelli designed/Brandywine Realty Trust building that marked the start of University City's renaissance. It is also the brain child of Jerry Sweeney, a city visionary whose leadership along the Banks and within the gridded city is largely responsible for changing the way Philadelphians and friends experience the city. I'm proud to count Jerry as a friend.

Next a broader view of the Schuylkill and Boathouse Row.

Next the back face of the museum with its fields of flowers.

Finally a few of the young people I met while talking about rivers and words.

Come to Philadelphia.

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Project Flow, Teen Writers, and the Color of Life at the Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center

Take a look at those faces (well, all except for the old lady in orange pants). This is the company I had the privilege of keeping earlier this day, as a guest of the Project Flow program sponsored by Karen Young and the Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center. Rising ninth graders—young souls brought from schools all over the city. A medley of projects created and taught by teachers who love words, science, and art. The leadership of Ellen Freedman Schultz, the FWWIC education and outreach coordinator.

This morning, I had the chance to talk to the young people about my three Philadelphia books—all of which have pivotal scenes on the river. One, FLOW, is entirely about the river, while DANGEROUS NEIGHBORS finds its protagonists skating on its frozen skin (with calamitous results) and DR. RADWAY'S SARSAPARILLA RESOLVENT features an historic river race. But mostly we talked about rivers and transcendent language and mellow yellow fish (as well as gold ones). By way of introduction, I asked the students to reflect on the colors of their lives. Their work was so exceptional that I promised to share it here, after shedding a little tear (so did someone else in the room! twice! we caught him!).

I like nothing more than chilling with people like these young souls.

The color of my life is a pink and a blue fighting over a green. Pink wants green to be pink and the blue wants green to be gold when green just wants to be green and left alone.

— Tiara

The color of life is a red orange flame, when blue cooler yet warmer, and black when deceased.

— Rafael

The color of my life is a deep shade of blue. A cool, calm, collected blue. A quiet silent in the night blue. And sometimes a sad blue. But on some days, this blue turns as bright as an afternoon sky.

— Liam

The color of my life is magenta. It's a color that's different and vibrant but can also be very mellow. I believe that magenta can never blend in. It's a color that can and always will stick out.

— Kai

Shades of yellows, oranges, reds, pinks, and purples along with the pale blue that I recognize wherever I go. As we travel back home from any city when I say goodbye from the car window. As well as before I doze off on the plane ride home from another country.

— Olivia

The rainbow, for all the crazy emotions I feel and when and how they come out.

— Rashae

The color of life is a brilliantly bright orange that shines pure, untouched. It is like the age of the sun except with a perfect unblemished glow.

— Jake

The color of my life is a light blue. It was once a very dark blue close to black-purple. As the story of my life goes on the blue gets lighter and lighter defining the very exciting and depressing point in my life.

— Erika

The color of my life is red because it's passion. The reason why I pick red is because it is the color of my passion.

— Nafese

So the color of my life is nothing. I don't think my life has a color or will ever have one, well, not until I'm gone from this world, but my life would be what I want to make it be. If I want it to be red I'll make it red. If I want it to be blue, I'll make it blue. But until I'm on my deathbed I will never know because I didn't live it yet.

— Juan

A brief P.S. When I returned home today, I had three notes about our river. One included a link to this gorgeous new review of FLOW, a book published several years ago. My thanks to Tina Hudak of the St. Albans Lower School Lower School Library Collection, in Washington, DC.

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