Final Thoughts on the Boston Experience

Thought on the Boston experience

I certainly learned a lot. I’ve taught bits and pieces of literature from the colonial and revolutionary periods over the years, but nothing can compare to being immersed in the area. Boston takes its history very seriously. In fact, I wonder if there is another city in our country that is as linked to its past as Boston is.

Simply walking down a street causes one to literally see the living history of the revolution. On the very sidewalk outside our Omni Park hotel, there is a line of red bricks that runs throughout the city. This is known as the freedom trail, which one can follow along and see all of the historic sights of Boston. In fact, within one mile of our hotel we could visit the Old North Church (where the lanterns were hung to alert the colonists that the British were preparing to invade), the Black Heritage Trail (where the civil rights movement really got its start where residents hid escaped slaves as part of the underground railroad – which neither underground nor a railroad – during the Fugitive Slave Act), the Boston Massachusetts State House (outside of which sits the famous statue of the MA 54th regiment (an all black regiment sent to help fight for the North in the Civil War), along the wharf where the Boston Tea party took place, and so on.

It must be odd for a resident of Boston to be stuck in so far back in the past. When we toured the Black Heritage Trail, we passed several historic buildings that are still peoples’ homes. One man entered his house with our group of 25 people standing across the street looking at his house, which used to be a safe spot for fugitive slaves. Since his house is a monument, he cannot make any changes to the outside. If a window breaks, according to our guide, there is a mountain of paper work that must be done so that it is restored to certain historic requirements. Think about having a tour guide talking about your house and 25 people snapping pictures of it the next time you come home from work.

I can’t really decide on my favorite part. I loved our trip up (at least if felt like up to me) to Salem and our tour of the various museums devoted to the witch trials.

The Freedom Trail was a great experience too, though I didn’t realize we had the option of not walking the two miles and just staying on the bus. Despite the trek, it gave me a great sense of what the retreating British soldiers must have experienced as the scurried back to Boston and faced intensive fire from local minute men hiding in the woods and behind the stone walls along the trail.

The Black Heritage Trail was an amazing experience. Our guide was excellent and took his job quite seriously. I never realized how big of a player Boston was in fighting for the right of escaped slaves and helping to begin the civil rights movement.

Our impromptu trip to Concord to tour the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery was another great experience. As an English teacher, seeing the graves of Hawthorne, Thoreau, Emerson, and Maycott was a real treat.

Another impromptu trip, to visit Fenway Park, was another highlight. I’ve always been the spontaneous type (or at least I like to think that) because the best moments of our lives tend to result from spontaneous decisions. I think this is because if we plan something, we cannot help but build up expectations for it. Sometimes, our experiences cannot live up to our expectations. But when I do something on the spur of the moment, there is no time for expectations. Fenway was a great example of that. Here our tour guide was excellent and absolutely reveled in the tradition and history of the stadium.

The Emerson House – where Hawthorne lived briefly. I got to see a sample of his handwriting as he engraved a small message with a diamond on a window pane (his wife did the same – as did other residents of the house). I also got to see the table from which he most likely wrote “Young Goodman Brown.” It doesn’t get any better than that.

Now for the low lights –

Our seven minute (yes, seven minute) tour of Walden Pond (which by MN standards was a lake). What a joke. We read the entire novel, yet we devote seven minutes to it.

The tour of the Adams’ home. Our guide was super. But there seemed to be a tour group in every single room, so we were quickly ushered from one room to the other – in no seeming order either – based on where the next group was hoarding in. So much history, but it was lost on me because of our light speed.

The morning lectures. They spend what must have been a quarter of a million dollars to ship 40 some teachers out to Boston and we spend the first hour or two of most mornings sitting in a conference room listening to lectures on things most of us already had read or knew. Waste of time.

The service in the bars and restaurants. I was amazed at how lackadaisical and often rude our servers were. Now we had some great service too, but for the most part, it was bad. I’ll take our MN Nice attitudes here any day.

Some colleagues. Some had the attitude that this was simply a free trip to Boston where they would go along with the tour (despite not reading a lick of the assignments) and get drunk every night.

Some saw this as a chance to show off how worldly they were and spout off about everything and anything.

And in some cases, the red neck nature of northern MN came out. One night we were in our hotel room and several coaches were gathered there (you can already tell where this is going, right?). Since I had no where to flee, I was trapped. Eventually, the topic turned to politics. I mentioned how I bought two Obama pins early that day. It was at that point that an elementary teacher and coach (amazing, right?) went off. “How can you vote for someone whose name you can’t even pronounce? He can’t win. I’d just as soon shoot him.”

Yes, folks. That’s what the dumb shit said. And this man is in education! Is that not scary as hell? Now you can believe whatever you want. I am not enamored with McCain, but I’m not going to bash him for something as foolish as his name or claim that I would shoot him myself because what this country needs is another old white male running it. That would be ludicrous. Yet, this redneck has a hand in shaping the minds of our youth. No wonder China is kicking our ass, right?

However, this mindlessness was balanced by several other colleagues.

I was able to surround myself with a little band of teachers who take our jobs (and the trip) seriously. Often we would spend the evening talking shop. I learned a lot from those people. They gave me hope for my profession, which isn’t always easy.