This year I had decided to choose one word each month during the year in order to document my own learning and living journey. The plan was to blog about it each month and to talk about the words I chose.
I did well for January and February.
I picked words. I blogged about them. I shared my thoughts.
Then March came.
Oh March.
I did choose a word for March.
I recorded it in my bullet journal after contemplating a list of words.
But I never blogged about it.
In fact, I didn't blog about anything in March.
In a year where everything about being an educator was a little bit harder, a little bit more strained, a little bit more stressful (okay, a lot more stressful...) I choose the word appreciate for March.
Appreciate.
I felt that if I chose appreciate I would slow down, look around and pay attention to the things in my life that were beautiful, that were good, that mattered the most.
I tried to voice my appreciation to my children when they were helpful, when they played nicely together, when they listened well. I tried to voice my appreciation to my husband for every thing that he is and does. I worked to appreciate the days I had at school with my colleagues and students after weeks of strike days and interruptions.
I wanted to view my world through a lens of appreciation.
And then...
The world got scary. The world turned upside down.
The world shrunk down to the walls of our homes.
And now we know we will be here for the month of April.
And maybe longer.
And the questions just keep swirling through my mind.
How will we support our students at such a distance?
How will we work to ensure the enormous gap in equity and privilege doesn't expand beyond what we can ever recover from? How will I be a librarian without a library?
How are my students? How are their families?
How are my colleagues? How are their families?
How are you?
How can we work to maintain connections? How can we strengthen connections?
How can we create connections?
How? How? How?
And I know that I am not the only educator struggling with these and many more questions.
So what will be my word for April?
How could one word be enough?
I chose breathe.
Breathe.
April's word will be breathe.
I chose to keep breathing as we move through this time.
I chose to breathe as we embrace and encounter struggles.
I chose to breathe as we find new ways to support our students and their families.
I chose to breathe until we are all together again.
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