Had a dream this morning with music in the background. Very pleasant, but it woke me up and couldn’t get back to sleep. So it went like this . . .

It was like watching performers backstage getting ready to do their thing, but it was teachers in groups of two and three rehearsing presentations for other teachers—kind of a professional development jam session. They were coaching each other and fine-tuning their deliveries with serious intent, but they were smiling and kidding and encouraging each other, like they were a country/folk/ rock band in rehearsal.

So this sappy music is playing in the background as if to set the mood for this jam session. “At the end of a rainbow, you’ll find a pot of gold/ At the end of a story, you’ll find its all been told/ But our love has a treasure our hearts always spend/ And it has a story without end . . . “

The lyrics mean less than the music for this dream. The music was something I heard on the radio yesterday with the mellifluous voice of Nat King Cole. It is the dreamy slow dance music of the 1950’s that rocks you to sleep. Ironic that it rocked me awake.

I saw that teachers were having fun preparing to share with other teachers.  It was as if their presentations were a by-product and their coming together was the point, the joy of their work.  And it made me realize how valuable these jam sessions could be for teachers who so often work alone and unappreciated. How this was the point of professional learning for them—the collegiality, the doing it together.

I thought this was my job—getting teachers ready to lead professional learning—but it was more of a celebration, a chance to share things we love in the spirit of gratitude, the sense that we receive as much as we give to this work. It is self-energizing.

But our love has a treasure our hearts always spend

And it has a story without any end

It was a dream after all—but maybe an instructive one. Maybe to remind me of what teachers get out of being together, how the joy is in the journey and the results are consequential, but not ends in themselves.

Nat King Cole sings “A the End of a Rainbow”

The End

Earl Grant
– Words and Music by Sid Jacobson and Jimmy Krondes
– peak Billboard position # 7 in 1958
– some pressing show title as “At (The End) Of A Rainbow”

At the end of a rainbow, you’ll find a pot of gold
At the end of a story, you’ll find it’s all been told
But our love has a treasure our hearts always spend
And it has a story without any end
At the end of a river, the water stops its flow
At the end of a highway, there’s no place you can go
But just tell me you love and you are only mine
And our love will go on ’til the end of time
At the end of a river, the water stops its flow
At the end of a highway, there’s no place you can go
But just tell me you love and you are only mine
And our love will go on ’til the e-end of time
‘Til the end of time

[ These are The End Of A Rainbow Lyrics on http://www.lyricsmania.com/