Children

A week ago I accompanied a 4th grade class to the Salmon Festival. Big, important event in the Northwest (no lie!) where salmon are a part of our heritage, our economy, our education, our conservation. Fall is when salmon begin the upstream climb to their beginnings, to start the next generation. The salmon journey holds many stories of instinctive determination and amazing feats, despite the interference of man. Conservationists fear we will run them to extinction, but other stories tell how salmon bounty is pilfered. Wow! We're a mixed-up people.

Nonetheless, teaching our kids about the world around them is important, not to mention exciting. It's thrilling to watch the kids' discoveries, so I needed only one invitation to come along.

The teacher I accompanied has 31 students. Most El Ed teachers like a class of 20-24. These kids are "squirrley", a word the principal likes to use. Good kids! Just four times the energy we have, and 1/4 the sense of how to use it! Ha! So Teacher had arranged 5 chaperones, to coordinate.

The day was well planned, an expanded program from 14 years ago when I last attended. We saw 6-10 varieties of live, chained falcons and other birds of prey, then moved to an inside lecture to an outside maze, to a fish ladder (where fish jump upstream), to a hike, to candy and pop and lunch, to a native American dance and display. My five kids were exciting! ranging from squirrley-squirrley boys to giddy girls. I hadn't seen them since last May, so branding names fast was a challenge. But fun! Fun with the arm around the shoulders, reminding, "OK, get the candy, but wash the fish food off your hands first...." or "guys, guys! back this way." It was a constant counting to see where my five had dissolved.

Yesterday I returned to help with reading in this same classroom. Madame Teacher is great, and part of her skill is her plan for repetition and reward. It was my privilege to watch and learn from her. Reading ended in an hour, but I returned later to observe more.

At the beginning of my time yesterday, she handed me 5 letters written by the students I had accompanied. Larry insisted on reading them. He has become as eager to hear my school stories as I am to tell them. I handed him the first letter, prefacing his read with my opinions of the boy: the quietest of the bunch, hispanic, didn't say a word to me all day till we walked away from the native American displays, then "I'm an Indian. There are Indian tribes in Mexico." That insight shocked me, but his letter showed more. Concise neat printing with more things listed to thank me for than any other student! An 9-yr-old diamond in the rough!

Then the squirrliest of the bunch who talks with his eyes, but you're never sure all he's trying to say. His letter was short and sweet, but his eyes are always talking.

And the sweet and prissy little red-head whose letter Larry said sounded like someone wrote it for her, so grown-up and thoughtful! Or the other two beautiful girls whose letters were likewise gracious and sincere.

Children have the greatest abilities to bless, of any creature on earth, but they also can cause the greatest hurt. They reach into our hearts, and may also run off again. They react, and may not understand. They express but aren't sure what they really mean. They are treasures that bring joy and sorrow. They are honest glimpses of our inner selves.

Loving children requires vulnerability, one of the most important gifts a person can give himself, yet one of the scariest. With it comes opportunity to see into the depths of human love, with the risk of not understanding the other person. Still, without it one will never get past the surface of kindness, to experience being valued, accepted, chosen.

Sometimes I struggle even now and want to protect myself from the people I love -- not just family. I'm tired of being tired, tired of being hurt, tired of being sad. What's the alternative? Miss the joys of being loved by a child? Withhold investment in their lives and never know their affection and admiration? Refuse someone's 2nd, 3rd, or 4th chance to prove himself, and miss one more polished diamond gleaming in the world?

Children are more than a gift, they are therapy. Most are honest about what they think. They reflect our own true intentions, perhaps on different levels or at different times. But they want to forgive. One teacher told yesterday of going to a disruptive child to discuss his negative behavior. The teacher expressed the problem, and the child said a simple, "OK." The child then went for a book, handed it to the teacher, climbed in his lap, sat while the teacher read the book, then willingly accepted correction.

I would benefit if I could accept my lessons that easily.