0

“Not Me, Us”.

I found this poppy in my 7 year old daughter’s backpack today. I asked her why she wrote “Not Me, Us” on her poppy. She said that they were allowed to write something if they wanted to – they wore these poppies taped to their shirts for the Remembrance Day assembly yesterday – so she decided to write, “Not Me, Us”.

I asked her where that was from and she says from the Bernie Sanders hats we were looking at online months ago. This kid!

She said that another boy in her class wrote, “We can change the world” on his poppy. And another boy wrote, “We can make the world better”. My heart was so full hearing that these are the beautiful words the kids chose to write when they were told they could write anything.

I give credit for this to my daughter’s amazing teacher. She is Jewish and when they were talking about WW2 earlier in the week, she shared a personal story … her mom was born in hiding two years before the war was over. Her grandparents lived in a village in France. Everyone in the village liked her grandparents. They would give her grandfather odd jobs whenever possible and would give them food. And members of the community would give her grandparents notice if soldiers were coming and they should hide. She told my daughter later in the day that her aunt and mom were given a pacifier dipped in honey to make sure they stayed quiet when it was necessary. She really focused her story on the helpers – the good people in the village who kept her family safe.

I believe the kids understood the importance of this story and fully internalized this message. And this is what came out when they were finding the words to write on their poppies. With our kids hearing this kind of beautiful message of helping at school, and with us parents focusing on kindness, empathy and compassion at home, our kids will definitely grow up to change the world for the better. We will be in good hands when they are the future leaders and decision makers!

Lest We Forget.

Let Peace Prevail.