Yesterday I met for the second time with the Spanish Language storytelling group. Last week only two of the children enrolled had come, but this time we had eight. They were all girls first and second with one fifth grader. They are all Latina and most from Mexico. Many speak excellent English. They loved Sophia the snake of dreams and told some dreams to me, and the new girls were most curious to see what else I had in my bag, little fun gadgets. We had Jesus Ramon, who we are making a story about, the crocodile puppet who begins and ends the class.

I had brought a lot of my old instruments I collected with me over the years and saved from when my own children were young. A tamborine. Some wood to shake, sticks to clack, bells to ring. A kaleidoscope. I'm unsure of where my rattle that I picked up in Oaxaca is but i'm looking for it. It's so much fun to make music and dance at the beginning of class! The kids loved it. We sang the traditional song Cucu Cantaba La Rana and the ones who don't know it are learning it. We will repeat each song over again each class until they know it by heart.

I also asked the girls to retell the story that they heard last week, or at least recall parts of it. El Buhonero. The Peddler's Dream. I retold it for the children who were absent last week, and also to reinforce it with repetition to the ones who were present. I also told them a story about a Conejito, a rabbit, who goes on a journey. They then had to draw pictures from their images in the head. Then they spoke about the pictures and I wrote down those key words in Spanish and English for them.

We met outside again on the coutryard deck. My husband had returned to finish the seats, and they are almost done. It was again such a beautiul October Colorado day. This is the time to be here. We did tree pose, vrksasana, and related to trees, such as the tree that has the treasure beneath it. My Spanish sure gets a workout too. I tell them that I still have a lot to learn. We do speak some English, if I don't know how to say something. They are teaching me Spanish!

I enjoy the diverse community of our school. We have a mix of affluent people in the neighborhood, as well as foreign students whose parents are visiting teaching at the University of Colorado. And then there is are a lot of chileren who receive free and reduced lunch It's a very close neighborhood and the diversity helps everybody learn and it's so much fun!

At one of our recent School Improvement Meetings, test scores with the Spanish-language kids did great, but still have trouble with reading scores. So we shall see if storytelling, yoga and fun with music, puppets, art and story making does anything. I'm troubled that this exists. So I teach storytelling in Spanish and in English with the other group. I'm upset right now at the Boulder Valley School District right now because they are out of compliance with the class size ratio, since this is a Title I school. It should be 18: 1, the way it was for k-3, but the second grade, where my daughter is in, has classes of 20:1 and 21:1. SIT has written a letter to the superintendent but I want him to answer to what they are going to do to be in compliance. It's an issue of equality. And I am comitted to equality.

The school has done such good things to really work at making a high-achieving school dispite huge odds, and we have this gorgeous garden! I'm hoping to do more with Wellness Nights, have a family yoga night to learn about health and fitness and literature and telling stories! From this I will blog more on. I'll have Maria Cristina Aguilar do the Spanish for me while I do the English (just easier that way). She's a Storytime Yoga mentee and former bilingual principal and has numerous masters in education. I'm delighted that she will be helping me and she is also doing the translations for the Spanish versions of Storytime Yoga books.

Things are going well in the E-Courses. I'm enjoying getting to know the women and how they work with story and yoga to bring this to their own families and communities, as well as enrich their own lives. We have been sharing dreams, remembering our relationship to our inner lives, and bringing forth those symbols to share with others. Dream telling is the most ancient and simple of storytelling. To honor the dream and make something from the unconcious conscious by sharing it with another. By relaying the dream image to another. We are already affecting each others dreams. From this a new myth will emerge. Myths are public dreams, Mythologist Joseph Campbell said. When I did body and movement with Rebecca Armstrong with Mexican psychotherapists last year in Oaxaca, we got in touch with our dreams and from the others' symbols how they affected us, created a new myth. Armstrong, who is the "daughter" of Joseph Campbell and used to hear him tell stories as she sat on his lap, told me that Campbell said the new myths would come from our own collective dreams. So we shall see what emerges!

I find the roll of the storytelling yoga teacher an emerging one. It's perfect for women, especially as we grow older. The mature and powerful feminine energy that is wisdom and knowledge happens during the second half of life. I, at 40, realize that i'm not going to cling to any young version of who I was worrying about my hair or wrinkles. What a waste of energy! Age brings a certain freedom. You can be your authentic self. Who cares? I'm not going to compete with those young girls. They are in a completely different story of life. The media traps of glamour I stepped into when I was an adolescent girl are no longer on my ankles. I walk freely and I've never felt better! But of course I do not watch any commercial television, don't subscribe to any women's magazines, it's a bit easier. Unplugging from mainstream media is essential if you are going to find the power within, to listen to your own story and practice yoga and recognize who you are. We have been stuck with princess imagery for too long. It's time for her to grow up and for us to claim the mature and powerful Queen energy which leads to the Crone. The power of life and death. Life is shorter now, as we march toward our own demise. But by returning to the wisdom of the old ways and letting go of the extrenal world, while very much engaged in it, makes life quite enjoyable and very peaceful. And i love putting it in to the world and to the children.

Finally on the home front, my daughter Paloma is with her friend Leroy from next door right here at the floor of my office desk in the garage making signs to sell their peppermint tea. They picked the peppermint from the garden at our house and then also made some tea. They are writing words like "Paloma and (Leroy's) Spice Tea. My son and his friend Augustin are jumping on the tramp. Time to wrap this up and get some food going!
Until next time.
Love and Peace,
Sydney Solis