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Date Posted: 05:31:34 01/06/10 Wed
Author: Winston
Author Host/IP: 72.73.238.204
Subject: Larry Loonin and Naomi Parry discuss "The Pond". (from FaceBook)

Larry Loonin and Naomi Parry discuss "The Pond". (Larry sent this email to share)


Below is a conversation I copied off FB. Naomi Parry and I had been chatting about Franconia for a couple of months. She asked me about what I taught and a few days ago I recalled for her some details about THE POND, a course I taught at the college in the fall of 67.

I hope those "times" are recovered to some degree in our FB conversation...




Larry: The Pond was amazing. Just a little beyond the first hole of the golf course and to the right of the President's house as you looked out from the back porch was a small body of water with a broken down bridge that crossed it and was used as part of the golf course...
Eleven students studied that body of water and it's immediate surroundings. Epistomology (how do we come to know what we know about that body of water. One student took samples found in the pond in an effort to name what was in the pond. Another drew sketches with different POV's of the pond. Another wrote poetry at the pond. Two people repaired the wooden bridge or at least tried to repair it. One photographed the pond at all different hours of the day. One guy studied the trees and plants surrounding the pond working with Coleman to name them all... One guy studied how the pond came to be...(underground water from Mt.Lafayette). Two people planted flowers and vegetables that of course never bloomed as the course concluded in Dec. But these two insisted that the fun was growing the garden and they didn't care about the harvesting...One person wrote what I guess could be called a personal memoir that perfectly captured the angst of being a freshman away from home for the first time...(she wrote it at the pond and as the weather became colder she insisted that she would only write while at the pond and so it was more and more difficult to read her writing as her hand probably was too cold to handle the green pen she wrote with) Three or four people tried to build a tree house that never quite got built though rungs were attached to the big tree and the branch held a person on some sort of ledge during that season and into the next summer. I think this was tried after the bridge couldn't be repaired.
Only one person screwed up though we gave him a chance to get credit if he could come up with a way to say that he had come to "know" the pond. It was suggested to him that he skip rocks over the surface, but that he practice and have the rocks skip at least 5 times before sinking. He suggested to us that he would have the rock skip 10 times. He never practiced and couldn't get the rocks to skip so he didn't get credit, but everyone else has credit for a philosophy course called Epistomology...It was my crowning achievement as a teacher...

Naomi..Thank you for a wonderful, brilliant description of THE POND. If I could go back in time, this is one course I would to take; even if I were the rock-skipper. That student, "The boy who failed to skip rocks," is a short story waiting to be written. What became of him? Did he ultimately learn one of life's important lessons, by his failure to skip rocks across a pond? There is a "Holden Caulfield-quality" about his determination to fail, which intrigues me, almost as much as the sucesses of the other students. Your creation of the course exemplifies pure Franconia magic. It sizzles with the excitement of the possible, when we were left to explore, in our own way, in the unique environment of both diversity and isolation.

Larry: Naomi, thanks for your kind words. The woman who collected specimens in the jars learned during the next semester that the jars weren't sterilized and therefore corrupted and worthless. Ruth P. was the person who made many sketches of the pond and of course I'm sorry about not saving any of them. She later got a Ph.d in Art History from Williams College. She taught Art History at a college in Arkansas for a number of years. Ralph Donofrio was the poet and I'm sure he must have saved some of those poems. In fact I think they were "published" at Franconia in some sort of pamphlet that was distributed sometime during the winter...I wish I could place the other students, but I can recall what two or three other students looked like. It was one of the Hippy-Dippy boys who dressed in high leather boots and who didn't wash and hung around in front of the college and one never knew if they were enrolled or not that was the boy who didn't get credit. He actually cursed me out when I didn't give him credit. I recall that he even complained to someone in authority at the college (though I can't imagine who that might be...) about not getting credit.
One other point about that boy who couldn't skip a rock. He would show up a few minutes late to every class meeting. He had every chance to come up with a project during the 12 weeks, but when he didn't come up with anything I told him during perhaps week 10 that he couldn't get credit. He spoke about needing credit because his parents wouldn't pay for college if he didn't get credit. The class came up with the idea of him working at skipping a "slate type rock" across the pond and came up with the number to earn credit.
I think he felt relieved that he would now get credit, but he never practiced skipping the rock and he didn't hand in a paper. He was probably shocked that the class and I expected him to fulfill his obligations. He was encouraged by the class to try and they even helped him find proper rocks. But for some reason (probably not concentrating) he couldn't get the rocks to skip and finally he became angry and said something like, "this is stupid". The class wanted me to give him credit anyway, because he tried and I gave hm every opportunity to write about the experience and what it meant to him, but he never handed in a paper and I felt I had no choice but not to give him credit... I actually sweated over my decision and I have the feeling (though I have no memory about what happened to him) that the course could have played a bigger role in his life than I'm aware of and indeed could make a very good short story...

Naomi:The Hippy-Dippy boys (with parents who could afford the tuition) were sometimes the FC students for whom "the hard rain was gonna fall." They were not at "the parentally expected Ivy League School." "The Boy Who Would Not Skip Rocks," is like almost a Shakespeare character, pre-destined to fall. What is touching is that you sweated out your decision. The Boy could not even grasp your generosity, nor that of his classmates, who helped find the kind of rocks that skip. Perhaps "damaged" before he even came to THE POND, this is a sad story. Yet his role in the THE POND, is as critical to the the story of THE POND, as much as it is for those happier souls, for whom the class may linger fondly in memory. Thank you for taking the time to share your experiences with me.

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