The Difference

Children need time to daydream. To put it mildly, children have far too much stress in their lives today. Being behind a desk for hours at a time, participating in sports, dance, music lessons, homework, chores, television, video games and the demands put upon them by their families can create a world where there is no time to dream. The expectations placed upon children by life and people can completely close off the channel of mental freedom where dreams are born.

As a small child, I knew the joy of dreams in abundance. Gradually as I became older and fully indoctrinated into my culture, my dreams became less important. I began to modify them to be more in keeping with what I thought people expected of me than what I honestly desired for myself. In recent years, however, I have found hidden in the shadowy recesses of my mind, a small packet of dreams which, though full of the happiest of good things, was sadly neglected in my adult life because of the demands placed upon me.

Dreaming is the act of creating your own future. It is where we exercise complete freedom and imagine life as we desire it to be. Whether it be tangible goods or intangible relationships, conditions or feelings, those dreams, in my opinion, represent our life-line to the future. When those dreams are absent or buried beneath a mountain of cares and responsibilities, our lives can feel like an unbearable burden. But what is it that allows us to not just dream, but to take the leap of faith and fulfill our dreams? Where do we get the permission to do such a thing in a world where people are often slaves both to their wages and to the expectations of others?

This is where children come in. When we are children, we don't have to be taught to dream and dream big. We do it automatically and without reserve. Children will unashamedly tell anyone what they want to be when they grow up and the only restriction on their dreams is their limited knowledge. As soon as they find out how to dream bigger, they do it. They can easily dream of flying like a bird, breathing water like a fish,running faster than the fastest car, traveling through time,inventing perpetual motion or walking on the moon. Then, all too quickly, the children grow up and are initiated into a dreary world of 'No Make-believe'. We insist that children put their eyes and feet on the real ground. We reign in their dreams like a wild horse being broken. Dreams are put away as childish prattle and the child becomes an adult. In order to dream, you must be like a child and allow yourself this privilege. It is your own permission that allows this to happen.

Albert Einstein said: “Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions.” When we fail to dream honestly, and not just within the confines of current social expectations, we lose the opportunity to create our best future. Children seem to do this instinctively; adults, rarely. The problem, I believe, lies in the absence of the priority given to dreams and dreaming. Most people put a high priority on personal cleanliness. Every day they shower, shave, wear clean clothes etc. But how much time is spent on creating their own personal 'better world' through imagining, dreaming and planning for it?

Cinderella had the right idea when she spent time dreaming, wishing and working toward the day when she herself would be a princess instead of a scullery maid. If she had spent all her time just working hard or had simply become embittered by the cruel treatment of those around her, she may have missed her chance to change her world. Like a child, she remembered to dream big.

Thomas Edison said that his inventions were one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration. Most of us just have the perspiration. Giving himself the gift of one percent of dreaming in his life made the difference between Edison becoming a world-class inventor or being an ordinary,hard-working man. In this writer's opinion, it's a difference worth at least one percent of my time. That's fifteen minutes a day for the hope of a better life. What a bargain!

Greatness Defined

I would like to be a great conductor. No, I do not mean a train conductor, but a music conductor. This might sound funny, coming from one who writes articles in newspapers, has twelve children and lives in small town in Idaho, but it's true. I love conducting music. I love it more than I love eating; more than I love sleeping. So how did I get to this point of wanting, even needing to be a conductor, yet living in such a place as to make this dream something like a joke.

When I was just beginning my musical education, i.e. starting band, I had a wonderful band director, Mr. Sheets. He was famous in our little community for getting some of the most amazing music out of Jr. High and High School music students. He won awards, put on shows, concerts and productions and inspired the children to perform at levels previously unheard-of. When it was finally my turn to be a part of the band, I couldn't wait. I wanted to impress him and I wanted to show him what I could do. So, before the first day of class, I had already obtained my instrument as well as an instruction book. I worked almost constantly from then until the first day of class to learn the notes and play my instrument. When the first day of class arrived, I was super-prepared. I played a chromatic scale, two octaves up and down and could play any song in the book, as well as play the highest note on my note chart. When I finished showing him what I could do, he was indeed impressed and encouraged me to keep practicing.

From then on, I felt a keen desire to continue learning and getting better at what I did. Mr. Sheets always thought it was wonderful and he always listened and encouraged me. Then, after two more years, some rotten school politics and a mountain of misunderstandings, Mr. Sheets was fired. That summer, he was killed in a painting accident. That year, I decided that I wanted to be a great conductor.

I began learning all I could about music, in spite of some of the difficult music teachers I had to suffer through after Mr. Sheets died. I obtained a degree in music education, believing that this would best equip me for my chosen vocation. At the end of all that, I sat in a class of Jr. High band students as a substitute teacher and asked myself: What in the world were you thinking? You can't do this!

The rest of the questions I asked myself went something like this: How did he do it? How did Mr. Sheets inspire everyone around him to such great heights? How did he get such a wonderful music program? How did he take a Jr. High classroom from complacency and disobedience to anxious wonder and excitement? Essentially, I was wondering what it was he had that I seemed to lack.

I did not have the opportunity to spend many years in the Jr. High classroom finding out. Instead, I had my own children. I have had twenty-five years and twelve children to help me figure out what Mr. Sheets had and how to get it.

What I learned was this: First, he believed in people. He believed that whatever they wanted to accomplish they could accomplish, without question. Second, he wasn't in it for himself. He seemed to care more about everyone else's dreams and aspirations than his own. But, amazingly, he DID have dreams of his own and he often shared them with his students. Some of those dreams had to do with his students. That helped as well. Third, he wasn't trying to save his skin by being politically correct. He simply followed his heart even if it meant braking a few rules. Fourth, he never MADE anyone do anything, he LET them. In his class, it was a privilege to work hard, accomplish and excel. What teacher wouldn't give their right arm for a class like that?

So, I want to be a conductor; a GREAT conductor like Mr. Sheets. But the last thing he taught me was that you don't have to be in a big city conducting a famous orchestra to accomplish that goal. He changed my life by simply being an audacious band director in a very small town. One life changed IS great. One child inspired to fulfill his dreams is all the success he ever seemed to expect, but after seeing hundreds of children rise to his challenge I know that it was just the beginning of what he would receive. THAT is great.

It's a Wonderful Life... Really

Have you ever wondered what the world would have been like without you? We all remember Jimmy Stewart in his award-winning role as the distraught banker whose uncle has lost a deposit of eight-hundred dollars which puts him (George Baily) into an impossible predicament where he is forced to grovel at the feet of the man who has belittled him all of his life and who can't wait to take advantage of George and even put him out of business entirely. Ultimately, George prays and is given the unlikely opportunity to see the world as it would have been, without him. He realizes that he actually had a wonderful, useful, productive life. But more than that, he realizes that without him, there were dozens and even hundreds of lives lost or broken. This final realization causes him tremendous remorse and he wishes with all his might that he might just have his old life back, even with all the trouble he might have to face.

I have often reflected on the power of the information that George was given. He KNEW whose lives he had changed and even who would have been dead, but for him. That knowledge gave him the courage to face persecution, financial ruin and even prison with a cheerful heart. So, I asked myself: how can I gain access to that same knowledge in my life? How can I know who I have helped, what good I have done or whose life I may have saved? If it really is a Wonderful Life, how can I know it?

When I was a child, I had a lot of trouble. My dad was an alcoholic, my mother worked, and my brothers took advantage of the fact that I had no one to protect me. I tried to stay out of everyone's way and just be a fly on the wall, so to speak, but I also wanted to help my Mother so she wouldn't have to worry about the house. I wanted to help my Dad stop drinking and smoking because I knew it was killing him. I wanted to be safe from the trouble and pain that surrounded me. Many times as a child and sometimes even as an adult, I have felt like George Baily, standing on the bridge wondering if his life was worth anything at all.

Not too long ago, I went to the hospital. I was clinically dead, they said, but I was still talking, so they kept taking my vital signs until they got a reading other than 'dead'. I had lost so much blood that I became unconscious on my ride to the hospital. They could find no pulse and I was not breathing, as far as they could tell. After a few moments I regained consciousness with a jolt, like an electric shock. It felt as though I had been kicked awake. I don't remember anything about when I was unconscious, but I do know that after I woke up, I knew what George knew. What follows is a small part of that knowledge:

One of my older brothers was in high school when he got into a fight. He was so upset by it that he got into his car to get away. I was about fifteen. I don't know how I managed it, but I jumped into the car with him. We drove down a dirt rode for several miles at top speed. After what seemed like a long time, he finally stopped. “Why did you come?” he asked angrily. I didn't know what to say. I didn't know why I had come. Then he said, “If you had not been here, I would have driven off the road and killed myself. I just wanted to die.” He then began to cry and we talked until he felt better and we went home.

Today, my brother loves people. He helps anyone who needs it, whether they have money to pay or not. He has a large family. His sons and daughters have traveled the world, performing, dancing, teaching. Thousands of lives have been touched and blessed by this one man alone...and I saved his life.

When I got out of the hospital, my brother was at my home. He had driven five hundred miles that night to be at my bedside. “I love you, Kathy and wouldn't want anything to happen to my baby sister” he said. It really is a wonderful life.

The Land of the Safe and the Home of the Caged

The longer I live, the better I get at being 'safe'. I can skirt disaster, trouble, difficulty and contention so well that most of the time I live a pretty contented and happy existence. More than almost anything else, I believe 'safe' is the word I would use to describe the direction of humanity during my lifetime. It sounds alright when I say it, but the more I think about it, the more I doubt it.

A woman I know was talking about when she was a child, about sixty-five years ago I guess, when her and her family would pile into the car and go to church. She talked about how glad she was that they were able to go, then realized that if they had had to have seat belts for everyone they would not have been able to go at all. She said that she wasn't sure if things were better now, with seat belts. I would have to agree. However, seat belts represent only the tip of the proverbial iceberg of 'safety' with which we are encumbered today. With automobiles alone we are saddled with safety windows, safety locks, airbags, safety glass, mandatory insurance, radar-controlled speed limits, licenses, eye exams, and now they are introducing satellite controlled tracking for more efficient policing. These are just a few of the safety measures to which we are subject on a daily basis. Don't you feel safe?

We are told that going through an airport scanner or pat-down keeps us safe from terrorists. We are told that purchasing food from Government inspected sources will keep us safe from food poisoning. We are told that if we have health insurance we are safe from disease. And the list goes on and on. I don't remember exactly when, but somewhere in my past I awoke to the reality that life was dangerous. Waking up is life-threatening and living in today's world is an absolute mess of perilous circumstances. I cannot do one thing in the day which will not put me in jeopardy. This is no secret. I think everyone knows it. But what is different about today is that people are working overtime to eliminate ALL the risk of living. They do this in a number of ways.

When I was pregnant with my first child, the Doctor informed me that I was entitled to a free ultrasound of my infant to determine if the child were severely handicapped. If the child was found to be less than normal, I was then entitled to a free abortion. (When he said that, I felt like throwing up.) So, I learned that one way of dealing with a dangerous situation for me or my unborn child was instant death for the child. Hmm.

In the year 2002, we as a nation were subject to the amazing display of “terror in the skies” when the twin towers and the Pentagon were attacked. Everyone panicked and felt the dreadful pain of thousands of people being destroyed. As a result, new laws were passed, new wars were started and we all felt safer. Right? I learned that when your country feels unsafe, you take away someone's freedom and you begin killing someone else.

We used to live near a school in a small town much like the one in this town. There were so many fights in the halls and so many weapons being used that the city and the school decided that in order to keep the children safe, they needed an armed police guard on duty during school hours. Random searches, police dogs, locked doors and restricted movement became the norm in that school. I learned that to keep these children safe we had to put them in a cage with a guard.

A small farm in the mid-west sells raw milk and the FBI shuts them down for food terrorism. I learned that in order to be safe, we have to restrict everyone, no matter how well-meaning he is.

And the moral of the story is: if you want to be safe you either have to be dead, or in a cage; and we aren't too sure about that cage.