Immersion

My friend Peter Saint-Andre has been writing of late about the need to immerse ourselves in that which is most beautiful in order to have a happy life despite what sometimes seems to be crumbling around us. Remembering this has been comforting. It seems to me that it is my job as a parent both to do this for my kids and to teach them to do this for themselves.

Last night, Madison's Bach Children's Chorus concert was with, as it mostly is, adult choruses and an orchestra; this time, it was the Rochester Oratorio Society hosting the BCC and also the Morgan State University Chorus from Baltimore. The concert's title was "Partners in Freedom: Lincoln & Douglass," and (even to Lincoln- and Douglass-lovers like David and me) it didn't disappoint. The combined choruses did a piece called “Sacred Ground,” which was the Gettysburg Address set to music by David Diamond, some spirituals, and a Mendelssohn piece called Laudate Pueri Dominum. Then, the two adult choirs did a version of Ave Maria I’d never heard and Kirke Mechem’s “Songs of the Slave” from his John Brown’s Opera.

Immersing myself in the music didn't exactly make me forget what is going on in the world, but it did allow the appreciation of The Best Within Us to take the active place in my consciousness. We need more of this. We need more of this in DEFIANCE of other things crumbling.

I hope Madison and Ella look back on their childhood as a time when their parents surrounded them with The Best that is within human beings, and showed them how to do this on their own. There are times and places for kids gradually to start grappling with ugliness, but it's not now. There is no need, yet. The girls will learn about how to deal with ugliness and strife later; now is the time for them to conquer the minor (or major, depending on how you look at it) challenges of learning how to learn, and how to navigate in what is still mostly a beneficent universe. To the extent that they can learn to surround themselves with what is beautiful, they will be able to find those fulfilling pockets of beauty, and create more of them, even if the world is not an ideal place later on.