Interesting patterns of lichen and rust on the old iron bridge at school. I am holding the image of this bridge in my heart as I think about how we make a safe and purposeful bridge for our students and community into the fall and beyond. What Will Be is going to look different from What Was. And that will be okay. We get to choose, now, to construct the beautiful and thoughtful and creative future that we want.
I have no doubt that there may be pieces of the future plan that will push me out of my comfort zone–continued elements of online learning, strange new schedules–but leaving my comfort zone is how I grow.
And, despite the changes, we carry important elements of the old way forward, into the new times, traditions that support and identify us as who we are, deep down. Some of the Beauty of What Was will permeate and inform What Will Be, not just at school, but everywhere. Let’s be deliberate, gracious, and filled with compassion as we create a future that is safe and humane and comfortable for everyone.
Gratitude List:
1. The hope of hummingbirds
2. How the children educate themselves, given half a chance. One is researching, in great depth, how to create and develop a Youtube channel, along with exploring how to create artful imagery and videos. The other is learning things about computers that I have no name for, but which I know are important to the world somehow.
3. Integrating some Qigong suggestions from a dear friend into my daily stretching and breathing practice. Sometimes, and especially at times like this, intangible gifts are special treasures. Every day, when I stretch and breathe, this will be like opening–once again–a little gift package from someone I love.
4. Getting kicked out of my comfort zone. I am not always grateful for this, and usually I am actually sort of kicking and screaming, but hindsight, baby, is full of grace.
5. Pathways through the woods. Yes, and I mean those, too. . .
May we walk in Beauty!
“Alas, the webs are torn down, the spinners stomped out.
But the forest smiles. Deep in her nooks and crevices she feels the spinners and the harmony of their web. We will dream our way to them.
[….]
Carefully, we feel our way through the folds of darkness. Since our right and left eyes are virtually useless, other senses become our eyes. The roll of a pebble, the breath of dew-cooled pines, a startled flutter in a nearby bush magnify the vast silence of the forest. Wind and stream are the murmering current of time, taking us back to where poetry is sung and danced and lived. In the distance a fire flickers—not running wild, but contained, like a candle. The spinners.” —Marylou Awiakta
“I don’t know if y’all heard, but women are the same as humans.” —Leslie Jones
“Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.”
―Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
“Joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.”
―Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
“I know that when I pray something wonderful happens, not only for the person that I am praying for, but also for me. I am being heard.” —Maya Angelou
“My pen is my harp and my lyre; my library is my garden and my orchard.” —Judah Ha-Levi (Spanish Poet, Physician)
Mockingbird Chronicles 