Night and Day

Every day at school, I am astounded by children. I envy their expressive and flexible bodies, am amazed by their insightful and surprising thoughts, am moved by their capacity for deep feeling, kindness and compassion and always entertained by their fantastic sense of humor. Every day I feel my intuitive faith in the goodness, intelligence and artful possibilities of human beings affirmed many times by 5-year old, 9-year old, 13-year old children and all ages in-between.

By night, I am astonished by the dead lumpish bodies of adult human beings, dumbfounded by their incapacity or unwillingness to entertain a single clear thought, bewildered by their meanness and their determination to keep feeding their hatred, shocked by their brazen lies and total lack of shame, flabbergasted by their insistence on accepting ugliness, ignoring artfulness and knowing no humor beyond that made at the expense of others. And simply unable to accept that these are the people that rise to the positions of power and purposefully harm the world for their own privilege, outward power and false sense of self-worth.

Night and day, my two worlds. Thank goodness I at least have the first to counterbalance the second. If only we can hold on long enough, my hope remains that these children will carry these extraordinary people they are into their adult bodies and future and then, a new world will dawn. Of course, that means schools and teachers waking up far beyond business as usual to notice these beautiful beings before them and bring them to the height of their promise.

Well, that’s what gets me up in the morning with energy and gets me to sleep at night with hope still with a beating heart.