Last week I mentioned that my latest book project has evolved into SEARCH TERMS. The way we seek out and engage with information isn’t just a function of our personalities or even a symptom of our bias –it’s how we change our minds and our patterns of behavior to become a fuller expression of who we are. When we challenge ourselves to think about new ideas, in new ways, from new perspectives, we grow and improve. But what exactly does that look like in practice?
This week, I’m sharing an example from my own life. My daughter has always been a reader, but when she was nine years old she took our tradition of the bedtime story to the next level. It wasn’t exactly her first “big book” rodeo – we’d read Baum’s entire Wizard of Oz series and Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – but what she did next broke the mold.
Over the course of half a decade – a third of her life – my daughter lived into one story so deeply that not only did it help reinforce her love for reading and help her connect dots to think critically and creatively about the world around us, but the experience itself changed her ideas about who she is and what she can accomplish.
In 2019 I took my family to the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles for a performance of Les Misérables.
I’m not a huge musical theater fan, but the play – one of the world’s most popular musicals – has long been a favorite of mine. I first saw it in 1991, when my friend Greg Blanchard landed the role of Enjolras in the national touring production at the Shubert Theatre. At the end of Act I Enjolras leads the students at the barricade in one of the most recognizable protest songs – “Do You Hear the People Sing?” – and Greg had a monster set of pipes. It was so cool to look out at the stage, feel all that energy from the song, and then suddenly remember: “I KNOW that dude!”
Since then, I’ve seen the play three or four times. There is something undeniably special about this work. I even sat through the movie once (but that’ll never happen again – I can't take Russell Crowe singing).
In December, 2015 I was in England to give a talk at the University of Chichester and I took my then-girlfriend to see Les Mis at the Queen’s Theatre in London’s West End. It was the first time I saw the play as a father, and Jean Valjean’s character moved me in ways I didn’t expect. Also, there is something about the alchemy of live theater – who’s in the play, who’s in the audience, what they ate or whether they slept or how what’s happening in the world affects their mood, the weather – that makes each performance unique. That night was electric. The cast was on fire and the audience was totally engaged. Not a phone in sight. When the play ended, everyone was paralyzed. No one moved for a full two seconds after the performance. I heard sniffling and I realized it was me. Then I noticed I wasn’t alone – half the audience was fighting back tears. When hundreds of us finally sleepwalked out into the rain, we all just stood by the lobby doors under the marquis lights. No one wanted to leave for fear we might break the spell. It was magical. On the way home from that trip I bought my girlfriend a ring and asked her to marry me.
Back to the future. The 2019 performance was yet again a completely different experience because my wife (she said yes! :) and I brought our three kids. Les Mis isn’t written for children, what with the whoring and stealing and killing and all, but our youngest dug it more than anyone else. She found a copy of the book that I’d never read all the way through – the unabridged version is 1247 pp. – and cracked it immediately. I was so surprised that I paused to take this picture:
She looked up. “Daddy,” she said, “will you read this with me?”
“Uh, sure thing, sweetheart.”
“Can we start tonight at bedtime?”
Okeedokee…
And so we did. For the last 5+ years, nothing – not joint custody schedules, not the pandemic, NOTHING – stopped us. Whenever we picked it up it was like we had just left off the day before.
Until last night.
Last night, my daughter and I turned the final page on Victor Hugo’s 1247 pp. masterpiece. After all the exposition, the relationships, the injustices and redemptions, the ups and downs, the histories of battles and Parisian sewer systems, the treatises on good and evil and government and society, the meditations on love and human nature and God, all that was left on that last page was a heartrendingly simple description of a single stone in an overgrown, forgotten corner of a graveyard.
My daughter and I closed the book and I wondered how she felt. Would there be a letdown? Would she reflect on the themes of the book, or the many ways it brought us together and enriched our understanding of life and society as it existed then and continues today?
We looked at each other and she smiled at me.
“What do you want to read next?”
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What have you found in a play or a book (or in the experience of watching the play or reading the book) that changed your mind or brought you closer to someone you care about? Drop me a line – I’m curious!
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Open-Source Learning is yours. Free. Get the white paper here. Use what works and customize whatever you need, however you want. I’m here to help.
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Curiosity is worth practicing. That’s how we get better at it. When it’s done particularly well, curiosity can be elevated to an art form. Curiosity makes life worth living. I am literally Curious AF. And now you can be too! Click HERE to unlock your free membership subscription.
Here is a taste of what I’m doing, reading, watching, and thinking about.
What I’m Listening To –
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: AI has nothing on the emergent complexity and wonder of the natural world. Today my evidence is musical. I know some people who have spent good money and better time learning to play the drums and the vibes, and I hope they’re not too depressed when they compare their skills with popcorn and mushrooms. Enjoy!
What I'm Eating –
The City of Gardena in Southern California is known for its Japanese community – Toyota, Nissan, and Honda have all been headquartered in the area – and last week my family and I spent quality time at the Tokyo Central Specialty Market. Our daughter is learning to cook and she brought a list. The following day, she spent EIGHT HOURS STRAIGHT in the kitchen to create a five-course vegan/GF Japanese dinner: miso soup from scratch, mushroom sashimi (her recipe, pictured), noodle salad, okinomiyaki, and a yuzu sorbet for dessert. Unreal.
Quote I’m pondering –
So long as there shall exist, by virtue of law and custom, decrees of damnation pronounced by society, artificially creating hells amid the civilization of earth, and adding the element of human fate to divine destiny; so long as the three great problems of the century—the degradation of man through pauperism, the corruption of woman through hunger, the crippling of children through lack of light—are unsolved; so long as social asphyxia is possible in any part of the world;—in other words, and with a still wider significance, so long as ignorance and poverty exist on earth, books of the nature of Les Misérables cannot fail to be of use.
– Victor Hugo, Preface to Les Misérables
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David Preston
Educator & Author
Latest book: ACADEMY OF ONE
Header image: Head of Medusa by Godfried Maes (1680) via Wikipedia and Art Institute of Chicago. ELO cover via Wikipedia. Wakefield fig credit: Mike Rowley.
David Preston
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