Why?

Why?

    I work in a developmental day preschool classroom, which means that several of the children have developmental delays, autism and or speech and language delays. We talk a lot about how everyone learns differently  and helping our friends who can't do for themselves. We talk about that there are  those of us who don't use our words yet when they are mad and how we can help them. We talk about who does and doesn't understand about other peoples feelings and sharing with others.These are important but difficult concepts for 3,4 and 5 year olds to understand.
  Yesterday on the playground , one little boy, who is typically developing kept saying "why why why". Another teacher asked him "why what?, what is wrong?"
This innocent looked at her and said "Why did God make (child) and (child) like that? I don't understand and I don't like it"
She was speechless and just said " I really don't know.."
Which made me wonder, what would I say, what should I say? and how can I answer that because I really don't know either.
Then I thought of a story that has been credited to Mr. Rogers. He said that during a tragedy of some sort, I forget the details, he asked his mother why and she said that she didn't know why bad things happened. But when they do  always look for the helpers, there are always people who are helping.
  I thought of this in relation to this little boys question and maybe the answer is because of the helpers . Because when God makes people like that it gives those of us in the world, the caregivers, the helpers, the advocates and the teachers our purpose. our thing to do, our passion.
I don't know......  seems a lame answer but  maybe its something like that.

HOME

This house was my home. When it was my home it looked different. It had a beautiful dogwood on the right side, a tall hedge along the back side, so from the road you couldn't see the back yard and it was always, always painted, clean and neat.

This is where my grandparents lived. This is where my mother and her siblings grew up and where I lived the first five years of my life. I spent almost every summer from age five to college in this house with my grandparents and any assorted cousin that was available. This is my house. 

I can tell you there are 13 steps straight up to the second floor that you see upon opening the front door. I can tell you that there is fireplace that I never saw used. I can tell you that the kitchen is so small that if the back door is open, you cannot open the oven door. My granddaddy built the large screened in porch on the side of the house and the carport. My grandmother planted and cared for a pomegranate tree in the back yard. There was a shed in the back yard that housed my granddaddy's collection of tools, fishing poles and other things and collections. The clothesline ran the entire length of the end of the back yard along the hedge. It was used almost every day. 

My grandmother loved birds and the bird feeder was in view of the porch and the bird bath was in view of the kitchen window.

I loved that house and the people in it more than anything else in my world. Every time I left I felt like I was being ripped away from my heart. 

I can still tell you where every piece of furniture was and what was in most of  the cabinets. 

This picture actually hurts my heart, because of the changes of the exterior that would've made my grandparents cringe. I can only imagine what the inside looks like. It is not my house anymore.

But in the words of Miranda Lambert, it is the house that built me.

Wedding

 I used to babysit this beautiful bride and her two sweet brothers (pictured below). I am not quite sure that she is old enough to be married, but she tells me it is true. I was so honored to be invited and a witness to the lovely young lady she has become.

 These two were not even in school when I met them!! Again not sure when I blinked.

                                              The gorgeous cake and table decorations.

#cancersucks

Cancer

-several years ago my church was gearing up for our annual Relay for Life fundraiser in our small town and various people spoke on how cancer had affected their lives. They had either personally, or a friend or family member had been diagnosed and they spoke of shortened lives, derailed dreams and finally of hope. Hope for a cure, hope for recovery and hope for others.
-I sat and it suddenly occurred to me that I no connection to these stories. I , of course, felt empathy for those who had been affected but was almost non concerned about how much was raised and who was working the event.
- As life, fate, karma and circumstances would have it....my story has completely changed. And oh how  I fervently wish it hadn't.
It began with my half-sister who called me one day to tell me that she had breast cancer.
Then my old friend from high school found out that she had cancer. Shockingly the sudden pain that my sweet oldest nephew complained about in stomach was determined to be colon cancer.  Colon cancer!! He is 28.  After extensive rounds of chemo, he was told the treatments weren't working and it is incurable. He is still fighting and we are still praying and hoping.
Lastly my father who has been battling lung cancer for a while was recently diagnosed with a cancerous tumor in his brain, He just finished radiation treatments and the outlook is good.

So this year....we are two months shy of Relay for Life and I care. I care a lot and am saddened by my own self involvement that it wasn't that important to me before. I want everyone to care, I want everyone to continue to have hope and to volunteer and contribute whenever or however they can, because I don't want you to have to become aware like I did. It is important and we all need to be involved.

Learning about water

Boats preschool style!

    We each had a boat and then we tried to see if they floated. After adjusting sails and the current (swirls we made with our hands) we each added objects to the middle of our boat to see what would float or what sunk! So much fun playing in the water and learning.