Gratitude List:
1. Giving.  Today is Lancaster’s Extraordinary Give, a community celebration of local groups and organizations that do good work in the world.  Here is the link to my school’s page.  If you click on the title at the top of the page, you can see the other organizations involved.  You can also see that since the giving opened at midnight 6 hours ago, already over half a million dollars has been donated to helpful organizations.
2. My friend Daryl Snider’s chapel presentation at school yesterday.  Open-hearted and thoughtful–the kids were engaged.  And I woke up this morning with his song in my head, “Yours are the eyes I see in the mirror.  Yours are the cries I hear in my sleep.  <I can’t pull out the words to the next bit>  Because you are I and I am you.”  We are all connected.
3. The helpers.  These people often find their way onto my list.  I can imagine nothing more hopeful and sustaining in the face of that which angers and terrifies us than the quiet and powerful work of those who simply step up and into the breach, reaching out their hands.  People in many places will try to use our fear and rage and despair to distract us, but the helpers are ignoring the fear-mongers and getting down to work.  And if our own stories or fears or needs keep us from stepping right up to the front line with the helpers, we can still reach out our hands to hold them, to make a net of support for the work that they do.
4. The coming break.  Fall is a bit of a long stretch for teachers, with fewer natural breaks than the spring.  The challenge is important, but it’s nice to see the end of this tunnel.
5. Late fall crops.  I got home yesterday, and Jon and the crew had set up the market room for the first of our fall pick-ups: broccoli, cauliflower, arugula, radishes, spinach, sweet potatoes. . .  Time to feast.

May we walk in Love.