letters to my class

Dear Humans,

As I was cruising through traffic on my commute, the sound of the highway kept creeping in. So I turned up my music to drown it out.

You can probably hear the sound of the highway right now. It’s tires rushing along concrete, it’s cars bumping over the road’s imperfections, it’s engines roaring. And it sounds about the same everywhere.

But if you were to go into each of those vehicles on the highway, you would hear a self-contained world. Some are listening to classical music. Some are tuned into sports talk radio. Some are bopping to the latest pop hits. Each of us trying our best to drown out the sound of the highway.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow tells us that the “hurrying hoofbeats” of Paul Revere’s midnight ride will echo “through all our history,” leading Americans to always meet our problems “with defiance and not…fear.”

It was true in 1860 when Longfellow wrote the poem to encourage the Union cause against slavery and succession. And it was true 70 years later when Grant Wood painted The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere at the beginning of the Great Depression. And still true the next year at Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s inauguration when he reminded Americans that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

And may we still hear those hoofbeats today as we face new problems with the same resolve and single-mindedness that Paul Revere showed on that night.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

I think we mostly know the right thing to do. There’s a simple test: the wrong thing is the easy thing we want to do; the right thing is the hard thing we don’t.

And it’s strange because after I’ve spent time doing the easy thing–scrolling the internet, buying junk at Target, eating junk from my pantry–I feel tired and empty. When I’m finished doing the hard thing–washing the dishes, cutting up vegetables for a salad, helping my daughter with her homework–I feel refreshed and energized. 

You’d think the hard thing would wear us out. But what’s really exhausting is trying to convince ourselves that the easy thing is the right thing.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

Recently I’ve been reading about the Waco siege. It happened when I was about your age, and the news doesn’t always make a lot of sense when you’re 10 or 11. 

So it’s interesting to relearn about events you’ve lived through. And what you quickly learn is that things that happened 30 years ago still aren’t over. As William Faulkner said, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” We continue to live with the history, so it’s important that we try to understand it.

I imagine in 30 years you’ll still be learning about our present situations. But whether you actively learn more about them or not, you won’t be able to escape them.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

Today we’ll read “The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere.” Revere’s ride (along with the rides of many others to warn of the British attack) took place in April of 1775. But Longfellow wrote his poem 85 years later in 1860. So even though the poem was about Paul Revere (with many liberties), it was also just as much about the looming Civil War.

History always works this way. People say that we just ought to look at the facts of history. But “facts” isn’t part of the word history; “story,” however, is. And the way the North re-remembered Paul Revere’s ride on the eve of the Civil War is part of that story.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

The other day I was screwing in a lightbulb and I thought about how old and lame lightbulb jokes are. And then I had a second thought about how lightbulbs aren’t actually that old at all. 

Imagine trying to tell a lightbulb joke to a medieval peasant (or a nobleman, for that case). Their only sources of lights were fire or the sun. And neither of them could be encased in a bulb. They surely couldn’t fathom an electric lightbulb.

And finally I thought about the future and how some day people will look back at me changing my lightbulb in the year 2023 and see me just like the medieval peasant–heading into a future I can’t hardly imagine.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

We cannot pick and choose when we put forth our best effort. Humans–unlike electric fans with lo, med and hi–are built with only two settings: awake or asleep. And when we’re awake, we should always do everything to the best of our abilities.

That’s not to say that everything is equally important. Some things we do in life are more important than other things. But we’ll only be at our best for the important things if we make sure we’re at our best for all the things.

Because if you start picking and choosing when we put forth our best effort, you’re going to find that your best isn’t as good as it used to be. And it’s difficult to get it back.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

Generation Alpha (that’s you) is pretty good at not yucking people’s yums. For the most part, if someone is really into something, you let them have it. You like chess? Cool. You’re a big fan of K-pop? Excellent.

But it’s not always that way. Because the thing about people is that people have opinions. And people love to share them. Which they have a right to. And we have a duty to be civil and hear them.

But we also have a right to ignore them. It’s not always easy, but one thing we find as we get older is that this world is full of wonderful things and experiences. And those things are much more valuable than other people’s opinions of them.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

There is no such thing as a natural disaster. Sure, the earth moves. The weather does extreme things. But it only becomes a disaster when people are in the way. And where people live is not natural at all–it’s the result of decisions we have made over time.

And it’s no coincidence that the people who are least able to weather a disaster are the ones it hits. Many of the people who died in the terrible earthquake in Turkey were refugees from the terrible civil war in Syria. And many of the buildings that collapsed in the terrible earthquake in Turkey were shoddily built because of corruption.

Nature is a powerful force. But its effect on human lives is shaped by human choices.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

We’ve been reading “Androcles and the Lion” this week. That’s the one where Andy pulls the splinter from the lion’s paw and in return the lion doesn’t eat him. 

And even though it originally referred to a Roman slave and a cruel emperor thousands of years ago, we still tell that story because the theme remains true. As they say in Latin, Sibi benefacit qui benefacit amico (He benefits himself who benefits a friend).

Stories last. No matter our current context, we can tell the same story–with a few variations–to help make sense of our lives. And here’s one secret to living the good life: know these old stories well and learn to see yourself in them.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt