“If you have faith, you can move mountains.” But when mountains move, it’s not magic. No abracadabra, snap once, POOF. Applause. …There’s crumbling, cracking, grumbling, moaning. There are fault lines and avalanches, earthquakes and falling rocks. It’s long. Sometimes Painful. Yet miraculous. A New Birth.
May 23, 2016 Dear Seventeen, Ten Years. It’s been Ten Years since you wrote that letter, and stuffed it in an envelope labeled “Lisa Kaastra: Age 27”. Ten Years? I can’t help but laugh a little at you, Seventeen. You were silly. But in a fun, naïve, adventurous kind of way. You asked, “Does the year of twenty-seven have all…
Predictably, about once a month I wake up and wonder if the progress I think I’ve made, is actually making progress at all. It’s like one of those “the more you know, the more you know you don’t know” moments – With Life. With Faith. With Dreams. Overwhelmed, all I want to do is just curl up in the fetal…
Dedicated to all of the persistent Mathematics teachers of my past – and those incredible colleagues who just keep on trying… Intro: The semester changed, and I recently found myself switching places from Grade 3 Art to Grade 9 Math. They were mid-unit in Algebra, and I had a lot of reviewing to do. Oddly enough… I learned a few…
One week you find yourself looking back at the pain in the past… and the next, you’re fearing for the future. They said, Get your head out of the clouds. You can’t keep on dreaming your whole life. Be logical. Be reasonable. Go to school. Make money. Buy a house. Become a useful citizen that will give back to the community. This…
On April 4th of this year, my brother turns 30. Or at least, he would have. It was cancer. I was three. He was nearly seven. My parents had to learn how to move on with their life. My brothers had to grow up with hard questions. And I had to learn why exactly things were now different.
We’ve heard this story before. After all, it comes every year; a seasonal celebration. Many of us have heard it over and over again, until we learn how to recite it like the sing-song Alphabet of childhood. And it’s beautiful. Annual. Familiar.We know it well… Too well? Not that most of us would admit. But it’s hard, isn’t it? We all want something…
I hope I never stop pursuing Secret Projects. You know the ones… When you’re six years old, collecting buttercups and dandelions outside to bring to your mom, and you’re so excited to show her how much you love her that you burst into the house with the mud still on your shoes.
Amidst the gratitude of Thanksgiving, the carolling of Christmas, and the first real taste of everyday freedoms, I inconveniently find myself in a rather poetic, albeit incessant, season of silence. Here I am with a world of opportunity before me: volleyball season is over, the calves are weaned, and the evenings are free of homework. I could not have asked for a more promising recipe for writing success.
It’s an old idea, but it’s a good one: some of the best lessons adults learn come from an elementary classroom. For example: Tying shoes is hard. Untangling knots is harder. Everything is better with recess. And colour. It’s okay to hug someone. Especially if they’re unhappy. Success is better measured by clipped corners and smiley face stickers.