A Sparkling Vision

“You have glitter on your chin,” my husband said to me when I got home from attending The Milk Party at Santa Fe College in Gainesville, sponsored by the Children’s Movement of Florida.  Laughing, I told him the glitter was from our granddaughter’ kisses, whose happy faces were painted with shimmering flowers and hearts.

The Children’s Movement (www.childrensmovementflorida.org) is a visionary initiative started by David Lawrence Jr., former publisher of the Miami Herald.  Its goal is clear - take good care of Florida’s children, and we will be taking much better care of our state.  Our little ones need critical improvements in 1) access to quality health care, 2) screening and treatment for special needs, 3) quality pre-kindergarten, 4) high-quality mentoring, and 5) effective support and information for parents.

This is a citizen’s initiative, rather than a political one.  Its intent is to draw on our best selves to do what we already know how to do.  We already know the standards of good parenting.  We already know what defines a superb teacher and effective curriculum.  We already know how to keep children healthy.  And most of all, every one of us absolutely knows that these doable things are the RIGHT thing to do.

The Children’s Movement has one purpose - to bring this doable goodness into focus - now. To pull Florida out of is humiliating, dreadful bottom-feeding statistics regarding the care of our children - now.  To fix the problems we already know how to fix - now.  Gratefully, this is not rocket science.  The solutions are not a mystery.  The solutions are a matter of energizing the moral and social will of every voter, politician, business person, parent, and caring citizen.

There’s much that sparkles in Florida - our oceans, sands, our fluffy clouds, sunny palms.  But nothing will shine brighter, or glitter with more consequence, than when we, in a few short years, meet the sacred goals of The Children’s Movement - to nurture every single Florida child so that s/he is fully prepared and eager to impact - for the good - our  beloved state and our global community.

-- Jani N. Sherrard 

Dream
She calls into the night.
Voice too soft for daddy’s dreams,
I stumble, heart awake, to her.
“Momma,” she whispers,
“I’ve had a bad think.”

Shivery
I’m shivery cold
all over myself
and covered with wee little spots.
I think the name
my mommy gives them
is something a bit like goose dots.

Geography
The place
where all
the books live
is the
live
berry.

Four Year Old Puzzle
I have these feelings
inside me,
but the feelings
don’t tell me
the words.

Originally published in Mother, Warrier, Pilgrim

Ansley has a point of view.
She announces it
with eyes squeezed shut
fists clenched
back arched
wails.
Her message is “No.”
Once you agree with her
she returns
immediately
to joy. 

1.  Plan to leave your job when what it used to mean doesn’t mean that anymore.
2.  Accumulate enough money not to feel deprived, or scared.
3. Assess your energy and have ample left to begin new things and tackle the projects on the “to-do-in-retirement” list you’ve been making for years.
4. Start a couple of brand new things—Tai Chi, a writer’s group, piano lessons—and undertake at least one task each month from your “to-do-in-retirement” list. 
5. Have a two year old granddaughter named Ella:

Ella will take up the slack and tell you what to do.
“Sit, Jami,” she will say.  And you will sit.  Then she will say, “Ella read.”  She will open her mother’s graduate school tome, The Teacher’s Encyclopedia of Behavior Management, 835 pages of tiny text with no pictures, and she will begin to “read.”  Exuberant gibberish.  Page after page.  More gibberish.  Mercifully she’ll begin to skip chunks of pages at a clip, gibberish waning.
  Finally, she’ll slam the book shut and reach for a Pottery Barn Kids catalog.  “Oh,” I say, “look at the pretty . . . .”
“No, Jami, no touch.  Ella read.”  This time words sparkle out of her mouth—  “Baby crib.  Bed.  Pink ball.  Aqua.  Jammies.  Dog.  Yellow moon.  Circle.”  When it’s absolutely time to leave, you’ll explain to her that you must go home to cook supper for Poppi.
“Jami cook supper for Poppi?”
“Yes, but I will come again very soon to play with Ella.  OK?”
“OK.  I luff you.  Bye, bye, Jami.”
 Hugs.  Kisses.  Waves.

6. Count your blessings.
7. Count them again.  

Originally published in Senior Times