In the day-to-day pinball of an educator's work, it is so easy, so urgent, to attend to the immediacy of the next little crisis, and so hard, so indulgent, to lift your eyes to the horizon, and take in the overwhelming immensity of the accumulated Good done on all those many days in the classroom.
Today we take your hand and urge your gaze yet higher, to the panorama of stars ignited, hand-to-hand, from hands you held, fragile, trusting, needing your self to find their own inner fire. May your hands still feel the warmth of all those little hands, now brimming with love, and may your heart have courage to carry the fullness of spreading galaxies of Truth, radiating out from the center where stand you, a Teacher, creating new worlds one child at a time.
Written in October 2009, for the miracle that is Trish Brandon, Director of Religious Growth and Learning at the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg, PA.
I think this also applies to you.
ReplyDeleteOh, Yes!
ReplyDeleteI have met many people who are passionate about a subject. But, I have sat with few who listened with rapt attention to my rudimentary questions and with tender excitement, endless patience and joy joy joy, does not just give me the answers, but rather his voice gently takes my befuddled mind out for a stroll; with drawings and questions and hewn steps of information he suggest peeking under that rock or behind that tree. And there, I discover the answer, as if I were the one to discover it for the first time. And he delights and celebrates with that warm beaming smile at my triumph.
Thank you, JD, for all the lessons.