Plans

I have put off making the plans and putting into action my dreams for years.  I hold off.  Wait.  Wonder who I am and am becoming. But plans are nothing without action.  If I wish for something but don't do it, then it will never come true.  I am not someone who fears failure.  But, I do fear the conflict and the negativity that can come from my husband when I do things that aren't....well, let's just say, the "norm".  I have something in my heart that has been there for years.  I rarely ever let it peek out.  I've not told anyone that I remember.  But, some probably guess.  I am burdened for the kids.  For a generation that is suffering from too much stuff and too little attention.  From too much privilege and too little discipline.  Kids are growing up thinking that nobody in the world cares enough or is strong enough t help them.  To guide them.  To DESERVE their respect.  I want a camera because I want to start a "project".  I want to photograph the children of a community.   I want to show what I see in them.  Because recently, I've come to realize that I see.  I see differently.  I see people.  It's not the aesthetics that I see, it's a person.  Their eyes.  Their hearts.  Their hopes.  I want to show.  I want to write.  Because our kids are dying for someone to see them.  Literally in some cases.  I look at preschool children who are stressed and depressed at age three or four.  And my heart clenches.  "How can this be?"  I want to show it artistically.  Photography could very well be my art form.  Not in artistic structure perhaps.  I don't really know.  But perhaps in capturing people as they are.  As I see them.  Their posture.  Their stance.  Their gaze.  Their hands.  Their clothing.  I don't know.  It's obviously not a laid out plan.  But, if I never begin the things in my heart because of the one person that I live with, then perhaps the person I live with isn't good for me.
I have learned so much in the last years.  So much in the last year.  And I want to live my life.  Really live it.  I can teach or do what I have to in order to survive.  But my passion is different.  The paperwork and the politics of teaching has changed so much that it is becoming to the point that it would be just as efficient to put the kids in front of a computer teaching them.  Then it could spew out all of the necessary data that everyone is looking for.  But educating a child isn't like that.  Not really.  Not to me.  There's so much more.  And it is so very lacking in our schools.  How to stand in a line.  How to say you're sorry.  How to make a circle of friends.  How to be inclusive.  How to recover when hurt.  How to clean up.  How to behave in different environments.  And the teachers still want to do so.  But they are so crushed under the weight of the other stuff that the truly important things are lost.  Handwriting is rarely taught anymore.  How are they supposed to function when they can't write?  I mean, physically, not mentally write.  The basics, the foundations, are NOT simply reading, writing and arithmetic.  They are so much deeper.  Beginning with teaching them to care.  About themselves.  About others.  About what they "produce".
I have more than simply passion.  I have direction.  I have desire.  I have ability.  I am good at doing some things.  Like computer work.  Like writing.  I should figure out how to do more of what I really love in my life to make my living.  Oh, God, let it be so.  Please.
grace to you.