Today was a special day. We took the day off around America to celebrate MLK Jr. Day. Martin Luther King Jr. was a special man who lived in America during a time when there were lots of problems between people of different skin colors. I don't really get it. Here, it seems like skin color is really no big deal. When we go to the zoo or the kids museum or any place around San Franisco really, we see people who all look really didn't from each other. And, when we go spend time with friends around the Bay area, lots of times the families don't look like each other. One friend has a latino mommy and an african american daddy. Another is Italian and Asian, another has one white mommy and one african american daddy. And, we read lots of books about all the different colors that people are and how beautiful it is to have a world filled with creamy milk chocolate and sun kissed sand, with hair like baby lambs curls and hair that floats like a river.
But, this day is about something a bit different than the life I'm living in San Francisco today. This day we talked about a man who lived when the color of our skin made other people not want to play soccer with you and stopped you from going to certain schools or sitting in certain parts of the bus. We read about Martin and his hard work to make sure that I could live in the world I do today and we learned that there is still more work to be done to make sure that everyone is treated fairly and judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. And, I learned what that phrase means. It means that we should care about what is inside us more than what we look like on the outside. I find it easy to think of the grinch...we care more about the fact that his heart grew three sizes (we care about our heads and our hearts) than the fact that he is green. When his heart grew, he was able to bring back Christmas, but his being green made no difference at all. This is what Martin wants us to all recognize....we need to care about what our hearts and our heads are doing....and then just enjoy those baby lambs curls and that creamy milk chocolate skin....it's all so beautiful!
But, this day is about something a bit different than the life I'm living in San Francisco today. This day we talked about a man who lived when the color of our skin made other people not want to play soccer with you and stopped you from going to certain schools or sitting in certain parts of the bus. We read about Martin and his hard work to make sure that I could live in the world I do today and we learned that there is still more work to be done to make sure that everyone is treated fairly and judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. And, I learned what that phrase means. It means that we should care about what is inside us more than what we look like on the outside. I find it easy to think of the grinch...we care more about the fact that his heart grew three sizes (we care about our heads and our hearts) than the fact that he is green. When his heart grew, he was able to bring back Christmas, but his being green made no difference at all. This is what Martin wants us to all recognize....we need to care about what our hearts and our heads are doing....and then just enjoy those baby lambs curls and that creamy milk chocolate skin....it's all so beautiful!
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