REPORT FROM PARADISE: The Clearing at Elison Bay - Day Two

The bell rings at 7 a.m. to wake us up; then it rings at 7:30 calling us for breakfast.  Oatmeal is always served first; then an egg cup or biscuits or pancakes.  Fifteen minutes before twelve the first bell rings for dinner and then the second bell at noon.  Two bells call us for supper as well at six.  Meals are early and delicious.  Before each meal the host reads the thought of the day.  It can be a poem or an excerpt from Jens Jensen's writings.  Kind of saying grace but not.  I like that.  I think I'll do at home.  Maybe...

This morning I felt like Oliver Twist: sitting at a long table, spooning oatmeal with raisins and brown sugar.  Meals are family style.  We pass the food to the left from each end of the table.  There is a faint British feel to the place and the customs.  But Jensen was Danish.  We sit at a different spot every time so we can meet everyone.  Spouses are not supposed to sit together.  Mix and mingle.  After dinner (which is actually lunch but they call it dinner) we take the class photo. 

Today is the first day of class.  I am exhausted.  Three hours in the morning, two and a half in the afternoon: talking and talking.  Teaching saps my energies.  But I love it!  There are five women in the class; all have experience with writing.  Their ages vary greatly.  Some of my exercises surprises them, irritates them, but eventually they come to see the value in them.  I hope that by the end of the week I have taught them something. 

After supper we sit in the prairie facing the lake and read for a while; later we drive to Sister Bay to connect to the internet parked next to the Bowl restaurant.  Across the street, at Husby's restaurant, a singer performs live.  It is loud and it annoys David.  We must go.  More tomorrow...

REPORT FROM PARADISE: The Clearing at Elison Bay - Day One

After six hours of driving we arrive at The Clearing Folk School - Jens Jensen's creation - in Elison Bay, Door County, Wisconsin.  A zig zag road leads us to the lodge where we check in.  Log cabins over flagstone paths in between woods populated by maples and birches, trilliums, viburnums.  From the window in our room I can glimpse the bay.  Perfect weather has welcomed David and me to this earthly paradise where I will teach a writing class for a week.

There are between twenty and twenty-five people staying here for four different classes: watercolor, stained glass, landscape design, writing.  We settle in, we take a nap.  Supper is at 6 pm.  We eat family style: tortellini with basil and tomatoes,  tuna salad on an English muffin with avocado and tomato and cheese, watermelon and pineapple slices, banana cake for desert. 

After supper we watch a slide show about Jensen and The Clearing, introduce ourselves, and break off for individual class meetings.  I have five students.  Good group.

I think I'm going to like it here.  Quiet, trees, birds, lake, and now - at 10 pm - a full moon in front of me while I write these notes sitting outside an ice cream parlor in Sister Bay where I've come to borrow the wifi from a restaurant across the street.  No internet on campus.  No cell phones allowed.  We are on a retreat from daily cares and sounds.   Or are we?  Some of us always figure a way to thwart the rules.  But then...