Reflecting on the past three years

Dear Friends,

This is what I wrote to the Center School staff over the weekend. Parents navigating the last three years are their children's champions. We salute you as well.

Dear Center School Staff, 

The light and smells of this March 12th stir in me, and in many, sense memories from the same time three years ago when our world sank into crisis and we had to remain standing. Actually maybe swimming is more accurate. 

Last week, standing in the Upper Parking lot at sunset looking over the pink tinged campus, or sitting in the sunlit carnival that was All School, or watching children of all ages and stages scamper up the snowy hill outside my office, any signs of the fear and exhaustion we've endured these last three years were eclipsed by joy, by accomplishment, by the undeterred will of resilient children and their teachers. 

Still, I feel the impact of the pandemic every day in my bones and my brain. I'll never shake the anxiety of trying to keep a school afloat in uncharted water, or the beauty of that 2020 spring when the roads were whisper quiet, and the birdsong took over. Imbued on me are the soft expressions of my colleagues in squares on my screen, in front of whiteboards, greenscreens, while puppets or pets or babies joined the conversation; teachers beaming love at their students. I still have flashbacks of what was pretty much a constant feeling of not knowing what to do while slogging and fighting our way to some sort of new process or procedure, every day for what felt like forever. And I know I'm not alone; I wasn't then either, because there was just this incredibly humbling and moving sense of vulnerability and collaboration of a totally intimate kind. 

I wonder how all of you are doing today and I send you my love. Your work during this pandemic era has been life changing. You are all heroes. 

With big hugs, 

Charlie