It's 10:30 a.m. on a Friday. I'm on vacation. I've been basically awake since 4 a.m. Reason? To witness the wedding of Prince William of Wales and his bride, Catherine Middleton. The dress was stunning, the bride was beautiful, the groom handsome as ever. The trumpets sounded. The music was spectacular. Even the sun came out - and if you've ever been to London you know that's a fairly rare occurance. Now, why did I and millions of others wake up before the sun to witness the wedding of a young couple whom we do not know and will probably never meet? Well, I can't speak for the millions, but I can speak for me.
Part of it is because I, along with the world, have watched William grow up. I rose early to watch his parents marry. I wept with him when his mother died. I watched him become a man and take on more and more responsibility as the man who will be King. I smile when he smiles because he looks so much like Diana and has so many of her traits and passions. Today, I admire the fact that with all of the nods to tradition and order and responsibility that they did this their way, down to leaving the palace driving themselves - in a decorated convertible with balloons waving off the back and a sign that read "Just Wed" over the license plate. It completely took the crowd and the media off guard. Kind of reminds me of a young princess that died to soon.
But here's the real reason. I still need to believe in magic. I don't think I'm alone in this. The world is a dark, scary place and if we allow ourselves to get bogged down in nothing but dark and scary we become cynical and mean.
Wednesday of this week was a simply awful day in the state of Alabama and across the South. Over 120 tornadoes touched down in the worst outbreak this country has seen in 30 years. In Tuscaloosa and Birmingham twisters the size of those we see in the Plains ripped a destructive path thru highly populated areas. Neighborhoods are gone. People are dead. It's dark and sad and just horrible. Across this country and around the world people are struggling to make ends meet. Gas prices are too high. Unemployment is rampant. Weather related destruction and death are seemingly more common, or at least more widely reported. Nothing's easy. It would be so simple to pull the shades down at the end of the day and crawl into bed believing in nothing and expecting nothing to ever change. But if that's what we allow ourselves to believe, honestly, why get up the next day at all?
When times are tough, it's not the time to stop believing in magic - it's the time to start looking for it. Whether it's the baptism of a baby, or the laughter of a 2 year old during his first real Easter egg hunt, or the helping hand of a stranger when you've lost everything. Maybe it's your family around the dinner table. Maybe it's a sunrise. Maybe it's an empty tomb. Maybe - just maybe - it's in the faces of two young people as they take vows to love, honor, and cherish - and then turn and face forever with hope and excitement and a few nerves.
Some are already tearing them down. Some are only talking about how much it cost. Some are already making bets about how long it will last. How ugly. How sad. I can't walk thru life that way, and I don't know why anyone would want to.
So, I'm going to start my day. I'm going to get in my currently un-air conditioned car and pay entirely too much to fill it up and then I'm going to drive 2+ hours in that very hot car. But at the end of that journey, I'll be sitting on the front porch of my sister's house, probably with a cold drink in my hand, and that makes all of the other stuff worth it.
My wish, on this day when a young woman married her handsome Prince and became a Princess, is that we all stop focusing on the dark and start recognizing and rejoicing in the magic that surrounds us daily. It's the thing that gives us hope, and makes the dark not so scary.
No matter how your heart is grieving
If you keep on believing
the dream that you wish will come true
Friday, April 29, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Paper Clips
We are so busy with our lives and so inundated with bad news these days that most moments simply pass right by without a thought or a notice. This fact makes the moments that are so unexpected and so powerful they stick that much more precious. And you just never know what shape they will take.
A few months ago my dad introduced me to a documentary called "Paper Clips". Since that introduction, I've watched the film twice and been in several conversations about it. The story is of a small Tennessee coal mining town that underwent a sort of awakening about 10 years ago and has been forever changed. Whitwell, Tennessee is a town of about 1600 hundred people. They are mostly white, mostly protestant, and until this project, most likely set in their ways without much thought of the diversity of the world around them. Following a teacher's conference, the assistant principal of the middle school came back with an idea that the students in the 8th grade should have an opportunity to study the Holocaust, believing that it would be the ideal way to introduce them to a different culture and faith, one that none of them had ever been exposed to. When the students began learning about the 6 million Jews that were killed in the concentration camps during WWII, one student wondered aloud about what 6 million looked like - what did such a large number actually look like. The principal encouraged the kids to find something they could collect 6 million of so they could have an idea of the magnitude of such a number. As you've probably guessed, the item was paper clips. Now, I'm not going to tell you what happens from here (get the film - watch it - and then watch it again) except to say that the project took on a life of it's own, and 10 years later a permanent memorial to the project still stands at the new Whitwell Middle School and has forever changed the attitudes and opened the eyes of this little backroads, coal mining, Tennessee town.
My mom and dad recently had an opportunity to visit the memorial during a trip to Sewanee, which is not far up the road from Whitwell. They did not get up to it as it's on the grounds of the new school, which was closed for Spring Break., but dad said that even the sight of it from a distance was moving. But perhaps more moving was his description of the woman from Whitwell who met him on the street near the old middle school, the original location of the memorial. I bet you have a picture of her in your mind already - and you'd be right - driving an old pickup that was splattered with the dirt of honest country roads, - but bright eyes and a smile that said 'welcome' - a startling gesture in a world when where most strangers are met with caution. She updated my parents on the new school and the new location for the memorial and all the teachers and community leaders that spearheaded the original project. Dad shared with her that he's involved with a Jewish - Christian dialogue group in Mobile. She responded, with tears in her eyes, "that must be so wonderful." That's how deeply this project has changed this town - and it all started with a question - and an opportunity.
I wonder what would happen if everytime we saw a need or an opportunity to make things better - we took it head on like the community of Whitwell, Tennessee did with this project. Can you imagine? What if all of the abandoned buildings became community centers with job skills training and after school programs. All the vacant lots became basketball courts for pickup games and a volunteer gave his or her time to kids with nothing to do between the hours of 3-6, which is when most kids get into trouble. What if all the land and subdivision developers set aside two lots in each neighborhood and instead of building houses, they built a playground and installed picnic tables, so that people came out of their houses and got to know their neighbors - and the idea of neighbors helping raise the children came back into vogue - and crime went down because we were are looking out for each other. What if, instead of walking over the empty can on the street, we picked it up and found a trash can, or better yet, a recycling bin. What if, instead of giving into to hate and cynism and apathy, we educated ourselves on our differences, and discovered just how many similarities actually exist between different cultures, different races, different faiths. What if, no matter who told you not to speak the truth, or told you to be quiet unless given permission to talk, that you just kept getting louder until you made a difference? What if everytime a spark was created, we grabbed the billow to make it burn hotter instead of putting it out? That's how moments happen. It's how change is created. It's how a difference is made in the way we live our lives for the better. We never know where these opportunities are going to go if we don't give them a chance to take root and grow. Some will falter - and others will forever change a community, or a nation, or a world.
For more information on Whitwell, Tennessee and the Paper Clips Project go to http://www.whitwellmiddleschool.org/ and look for the Holocaust project link. The memorial is available for viewing year round. If school isn't open, just stop by the police station. They'll let you in.
A few months ago my dad introduced me to a documentary called "Paper Clips". Since that introduction, I've watched the film twice and been in several conversations about it. The story is of a small Tennessee coal mining town that underwent a sort of awakening about 10 years ago and has been forever changed. Whitwell, Tennessee is a town of about 1600 hundred people. They are mostly white, mostly protestant, and until this project, most likely set in their ways without much thought of the diversity of the world around them. Following a teacher's conference, the assistant principal of the middle school came back with an idea that the students in the 8th grade should have an opportunity to study the Holocaust, believing that it would be the ideal way to introduce them to a different culture and faith, one that none of them had ever been exposed to. When the students began learning about the 6 million Jews that were killed in the concentration camps during WWII, one student wondered aloud about what 6 million looked like - what did such a large number actually look like. The principal encouraged the kids to find something they could collect 6 million of so they could have an idea of the magnitude of such a number. As you've probably guessed, the item was paper clips. Now, I'm not going to tell you what happens from here (get the film - watch it - and then watch it again) except to say that the project took on a life of it's own, and 10 years later a permanent memorial to the project still stands at the new Whitwell Middle School and has forever changed the attitudes and opened the eyes of this little backroads, coal mining, Tennessee town.
My mom and dad recently had an opportunity to visit the memorial during a trip to Sewanee, which is not far up the road from Whitwell. They did not get up to it as it's on the grounds of the new school, which was closed for Spring Break., but dad said that even the sight of it from a distance was moving. But perhaps more moving was his description of the woman from Whitwell who met him on the street near the old middle school, the original location of the memorial. I bet you have a picture of her in your mind already - and you'd be right - driving an old pickup that was splattered with the dirt of honest country roads, - but bright eyes and a smile that said 'welcome' - a startling gesture in a world when where most strangers are met with caution. She updated my parents on the new school and the new location for the memorial and all the teachers and community leaders that spearheaded the original project. Dad shared with her that he's involved with a Jewish - Christian dialogue group in Mobile. She responded, with tears in her eyes, "that must be so wonderful." That's how deeply this project has changed this town - and it all started with a question - and an opportunity.
I wonder what would happen if everytime we saw a need or an opportunity to make things better - we took it head on like the community of Whitwell, Tennessee did with this project. Can you imagine? What if all of the abandoned buildings became community centers with job skills training and after school programs. All the vacant lots became basketball courts for pickup games and a volunteer gave his or her time to kids with nothing to do between the hours of 3-6, which is when most kids get into trouble. What if all the land and subdivision developers set aside two lots in each neighborhood and instead of building houses, they built a playground and installed picnic tables, so that people came out of their houses and got to know their neighbors - and the idea of neighbors helping raise the children came back into vogue - and crime went down because we were are looking out for each other. What if, instead of walking over the empty can on the street, we picked it up and found a trash can, or better yet, a recycling bin. What if, instead of giving into to hate and cynism and apathy, we educated ourselves on our differences, and discovered just how many similarities actually exist between different cultures, different races, different faiths. What if, no matter who told you not to speak the truth, or told you to be quiet unless given permission to talk, that you just kept getting louder until you made a difference? What if everytime a spark was created, we grabbed the billow to make it burn hotter instead of putting it out? That's how moments happen. It's how change is created. It's how a difference is made in the way we live our lives for the better. We never know where these opportunities are going to go if we don't give them a chance to take root and grow. Some will falter - and others will forever change a community, or a nation, or a world.
For more information on Whitwell, Tennessee and the Paper Clips Project go to http://www.whitwellmiddleschool.org/ and look for the Holocaust project link. The memorial is available for viewing year round. If school isn't open, just stop by the police station. They'll let you in.
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