The Benefit of the Doubt

My students are often on my mind.  I wonder how they're doing or if they are happy, healthy, and safe.  I look at them and marvel at their individuality and their happy dispositions; how they become excited over moments others find mundane or insignificant.  I hope for them and pray for them.  I want them all to grow to be the best people they can be; an extension of the little people they already are.

Every so often, something happens in my life outside of work; something unfair or sad, or very "adult-like."  I find that in these moments, my student's faces flash in my mind.  I wonder if they'll be subject to the unfair, and sometimes cruel aspects of life that cause us to struggle.  I experienced this over the weekend after receiving some particularly tragic news.

After thinking of my students, and hoping that nothing so sad ever enters their rosy existence, I wondered how I will feel when I have children of my own.  My boss told me the other day that "being a parent is scary."  I reflected on this statement for a while.  Yes, I love my students and I think they are all wonderful; but my care and affection for them is but a pebble in comparison to the mountain of love their parents provide.

I sometimes find myself questioning the parenting methods used with my students.  It is easy for me to be skeptical and overly critical of them, without having children of my own.  The simple statement, "being a parent is scary," along with the tragedy that occurred in the life of a close friend of mine, allowed me to put into perspective the daily dealings of in a relationship between parent and child.

Every parent in my school, (thankfully), is trying their hardest to provide their children with a loving and stable environment.  Sometimes, children are terrifying; the hardships you hope they never endure, the people you hope never hurt them, the friends you pray will stick by their side, and the tragedies you hope will never befall them.  I hope and pray for my students daily, and the care and affection I have for them is substantial in their little lives.  However, I understand that I will never know that pure, undying, and sometimes scary love that parents have for their children, until I'm blessed with one of my own.