This is so well done, Dawn. As a teacher in England, my heart breaks for teachers, parents and children in the USA. We haven’t got to subject our pupils and parents to this level of vigilance and anxiety …. Yet!
Thank you, Emma. Yes, it time to look at the statistics in this country and that what is happening here is not "the norm" nor should it ever be. Thanks so much for reading and offering your thoughts.
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment, Matthew. Well, you are surrounded and likely hear some of the "school speak" that just happens to slip out after days in the classrooms! It is a wondrous profession, truly, spending days with the amazing minds of children of all ages. They were my teachers in so many ways. I honor your mothers, sister and wife.
Dawn - as I began reading your post, my mind kept leaping from one "fact of life" to another. Certainly there are many associated with my personal life. And certainly there are many associated with our failing education system - perhaps begun with the Covid epidemic, perhaps (and likely) a problem created by poor fore site in the past which has culminated in the painful truth that we now deal with in hind site. But there is so much more that we need to deal with today; we read of these problems in the papers every day. None affect or frighten me as much as our political system. I won't go into my personal ideology, but whatever one believes, I would hope that fact of life which we are living with now - the devision, the hate, the inability to have open discussions - does not remain with us and that we, as a caring and intelligent nation, will learn to put aside our differences and come to logical courses of actions which will allow us to live in harmony for the best of our nation and for ourselves.
Dawn, my Jewish ancestors had a saying that hold true today: "Fun dayn moyl in gots oyern"
Today we pronounce it as "From your mouth to G-d's ear" and is as relevant today as it was back when my great, great grandparents and those before them chanted it.
Thank you, CJ, for being here and for your vision that I so love - "that as a caring and intelligent nation, we will learn to put aside our differences and come to logical courses of actions which will allow us to live in harmony for the best of the nation and for ourselves." That is so beautifully said as we walk through each day so filled with deeply challenging situations.
And in the midst of that to look for the beauty and the joy that also exists in this world and that I felt so keenly every day when in the halls and classrooms and dining rooms with children.
For a number of years I have imagined. as long as the two party system exists, that those in Washington will not have an aisle but will do away with the rows and put in tables of 8. Four of each party sit together, look at each other, and talk and work together for what you articulated.
Thank you for stepping in to this particular stream and wading into the deep questions it asks of us as a society, and also each of us as feeling, reasoning beings.
How did we get here, indeed, and how do we contain this poison until we can agree to work together to snuff it out? How to push the genie back into the bottle? Is there truly a path to return our children ( at least) to a place of assumed safety and stop this march into what in retrospect will surely be seen madness?
Heavy, solemn stuff that should certainly push aside party lines and the seemingly endless ways that arise to keep us separate, fearful, and warring.
I ache, holding these very real questions, feeling deeply inadequate yet also strangely confident that the ways we choose as individuals ultimately will change the ways of our society. When, exactly how, I do not presume to know.
Thank you, Dawn, for writing about these anguishing truths in a way that opens doors to more questions, dare I say even discourse.
How wonderful to read your wise words and "see" you, Melinda.
Ah, the deep questions we do face and the need for the courage and energy with which to, as you say, wade into them and to engage in civil, open, compassionate discourse. I, too, feel inadequate but maybe if we all pool our strengths we can find a way forward on behalf of the children, most of all.
I believe, with you, in a future where we will give witness to changes we do not yet see but that will shift to ways of being that bring us together.
This is so well done, Dawn. As a teacher in England, my heart breaks for teachers, parents and children in the USA. We haven’t got to subject our pupils and parents to this level of vigilance and anxiety …. Yet!
Thank you, Emma. Yes, it time to look at the statistics in this country and that what is happening here is not "the norm" nor should it ever be. Thanks so much for reading and offering your thoughts.
Keep up the great work Dawn. My mother, sister, and wife are all teachers. Lots of love for that profession.
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment, Matthew. Well, you are surrounded and likely hear some of the "school speak" that just happens to slip out after days in the classrooms! It is a wondrous profession, truly, spending days with the amazing minds of children of all ages. They were my teachers in so many ways. I honor your mothers, sister and wife.
Dawn - as I began reading your post, my mind kept leaping from one "fact of life" to another. Certainly there are many associated with my personal life. And certainly there are many associated with our failing education system - perhaps begun with the Covid epidemic, perhaps (and likely) a problem created by poor fore site in the past which has culminated in the painful truth that we now deal with in hind site. But there is so much more that we need to deal with today; we read of these problems in the papers every day. None affect or frighten me as much as our political system. I won't go into my personal ideology, but whatever one believes, I would hope that fact of life which we are living with now - the devision, the hate, the inability to have open discussions - does not remain with us and that we, as a caring and intelligent nation, will learn to put aside our differences and come to logical courses of actions which will allow us to live in harmony for the best of our nation and for ourselves.
Dawn, my Jewish ancestors had a saying that hold true today: "Fun dayn moyl in gots oyern"
Today we pronounce it as "From your mouth to G-d's ear" and is as relevant today as it was back when my great, great grandparents and those before them chanted it.
Thank you, CJ, for being here and for your vision that I so love - "that as a caring and intelligent nation, we will learn to put aside our differences and come to logical courses of actions which will allow us to live in harmony for the best of the nation and for ourselves." That is so beautifully said as we walk through each day so filled with deeply challenging situations.
And in the midst of that to look for the beauty and the joy that also exists in this world and that I felt so keenly every day when in the halls and classrooms and dining rooms with children.
For a number of years I have imagined. as long as the two party system exists, that those in Washington will not have an aisle but will do away with the rows and put in tables of 8. Four of each party sit together, look at each other, and talk and work together for what you articulated.
Thank you for stepping in to this particular stream and wading into the deep questions it asks of us as a society, and also each of us as feeling, reasoning beings.
How did we get here, indeed, and how do we contain this poison until we can agree to work together to snuff it out? How to push the genie back into the bottle? Is there truly a path to return our children ( at least) to a place of assumed safety and stop this march into what in retrospect will surely be seen madness?
Heavy, solemn stuff that should certainly push aside party lines and the seemingly endless ways that arise to keep us separate, fearful, and warring.
I ache, holding these very real questions, feeling deeply inadequate yet also strangely confident that the ways we choose as individuals ultimately will change the ways of our society. When, exactly how, I do not presume to know.
Thank you, Dawn, for writing about these anguishing truths in a way that opens doors to more questions, dare I say even discourse.
How wonderful to read your wise words and "see" you, Melinda.
Ah, the deep questions we do face and the need for the courage and energy with which to, as you say, wade into them and to engage in civil, open, compassionate discourse. I, too, feel inadequate but maybe if we all pool our strengths we can find a way forward on behalf of the children, most of all.
I believe, with you, in a future where we will give witness to changes we do not yet see but that will shift to ways of being that bring us together.