Walden and the Beans

November is bean planting time in my classroom. We are about to read sections of Walden, where Thoreau contemplates the battles of weeds and beans in his life, and I realized a few years ago that not every student knew what a bean leaf looks like. So now, juniors plant beans: 2 Indian Woman beans to a four inch pot. If you bring your bean to “harvest” you get extra credit. It is not as easy as it sounds. It takes about two months from planting to the first little bean hanging from the vine. Plants grow long and thin, easy to break, on the north side of a building in November and ninth graders checking on the progress of a sibling’s bean can be a little aggressive. Accidents happen.  There are always jokes about who will not be raising food after the apocalypse.  Some people name their beans—Beanadette, Jim Bean- to help with the process while others bring in charms or fold tiny paper cranes. They water, and measure, and consider the beans every day, even when we don’t have class. They become, for a brief time, farmers.

Last week, one girl decided to sit with her bean during class. It had just put on the first true leaves, that bright young green that we usually see in early June. She held the bean, in its round pot, against her dark shirt, in front of her heart. Head down, hair curving around her face, stroking the leaf, considering its form… there were circles within circles, a poster child for Youth and Hope in dire times.