At a glance

When I first began teaching, all of us first years attended (by force) these insipid seminars and get-to-know-you deals. During one of those, we shared artwork we'd made about who we are; the following poem was the crux of my me-collage. So I guess this is a glimpse at what grips my heart, makes it beat. And makes it stop.

We Are Responsible
by Ina Hughes

"We are responsible
for children who put chocolate fingers everywhere,
who like to be tickled,
who stomp in puddles and ruin their pants,
who sneak popsicles before supper, who erase holes in math workbooks,
who can never find their shoes.

And we are responsible
for those who stare at photographers from behind barbed wires,
who can't bound down the street in a new pair of sneakers,
who never "counted potatoes,"
who are born in places we wouldn't be caught dead,
who never got to the circus,
who live in an x-rated world.

We are responsible
for children who give us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
who sleep with the dog and bury goldfish,
who judge us in a hurry and forget their lunch money,
who cover themselves with Band-Aids and sing off-key,
who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink,
who slurp their soup.

And we are responsible
for those who never get dessert,
who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
who watch their parents watch them die,
who can't find any bread to steal,
who don't have any rooms to clean up,
whose pictures aren't on anybody's dresser,
whose monsters are real.

We are responsible
for children who spend all their allowance before Tuesday,
who throw tantrums in the grocer store and pick at their food,
who like ghost stories,
who shove dirty clothes under the bed, and never rinse the tub,
who get visits from the tooth fairy,
who don't like to be kissed in front of the carpool,
who squirm in church and scream in the phone,
whose tears we sometimes laugh at and whose smiles can make us cry.

And we are responsible
for those whose nightmares come in the daytime,
who will eat anything,
who have never seen a dentist,
who aren't spoiled by anybody,
who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep,
who live and move, but have no being.

We are responsible for children who want to be carried,
and for those who must.
For those we never give up on,
and for those who don't get a second chance.
For those we smother
...and for those who will grab the hand of anybody kind enough to offer it."



And I'm guessing that now you're all thinking the same thing I'm always told whenever I speak my passions for a few minutes: that I've missed my call to missions. Which may be true, but I'd like to think it's still coming.

After the arrival of several of my offspring, I sometimes feared it was coming. I dreamed about arriving in Africa, with the land shadowed and literally writhing with venomous snakes and spiders and crocodiles, and I was trying to hold all my children at once, to keep them from death. I woke with cold fear coursing through me.

But I've come to terms, since then, with what I already knew: that my children can die anywhere. They can suffer and die right here, in the safe midwest of safe, affluent North America, surrounded by the best hospitals and technology and surgeons. And that there are worse things than dying.

And that, ultimately, the safest place--the best place--to be is exactly where God wants you, doing exactly what he's asked you to do.