The other day, I watched most of an amazing documentary on BBC 2. Entitled "The Choir," it follows the staff and students of the school next to the Grenfell Tower in London (the apartment building which burned in 2017) as they create a concert/musical event to mark the re-opening of their school.
Here's what was so moving for me; teachers and staff encouraged the students to be themselves, to express as much of their emotion and talent as they could and wished to. Most of these 12- and 14-year olds were much as I was at the same age, pale and bespectacled, with frizzy hair and a school uniform. They were every bit as unselfconfident as I was in 1968. But the difference was that the teachers in this marvellous, diverse school were active in their encouragement and honest in their own emotions, their own eyes welling up with tears as the students created skits and songs about the horrors of that event. I tried to imagine such honest "presence" in my own early teachers, and couldn't. This isn't to criticize them, but it was simply another era.
Here I am, a 63-year old woman trying step-by-step to learn how to feel safe telling my own stories. I've made a commitment to moving beyond this blog to tell my story, which I have only scratched the surface of. I though this morning, maybe "home" is actually where people want to hear your stories, where your reality isn't pushed back and contradicted. Maybe home is where people say, tell me everything. Your story is safe with me, and it will enrich me to hear it. And where you feel safe in the telling.
