These smiles were brought to you by Noticing and Oprah?

My Sheroes
Rochelle and Tshanda

It was an ordinary day that had me roaming the halls looking for a purpose for my extra time.  Clearly, there was something that I was suppose to be doing but wasn't.  I ran into a colleague who shared what some elementary teachers call a "Sunshine Story" that too rarely in high school, we don't get to exchange.  I listened to a story of how a young woman was working really hard and she was finally experiencing the 'fruits of her labour'.  At that point, it was just information.  I walked back upstairs to check emails. I noticed one with the subject line: "Know any Oprah fans?"  Well I think it took me about 1.8 seconds to figure out what was going on.  That email was coming from a long time friend who works at our local newspaper.  She's either doing a story or ......When I read the email, she was looking for what comes after or.....

"I've been given two tickets to see Oprah at Scotiabank Place on Wednesday evening. I'd like to take someone who is going to be very excited to see Oprah in person, and who perhaps couldn't afford a ticket on her own. Maybe it's a young woman who sees Oprah as a role model, or an older woman who admires her shows."

For anyone who is an Executive Opportunities Broker of a community organization, this is like volleyball.  Someone served it up so I just have to spike.  I'm SURE I can think of someone!  Back and forth we went until the next morning - day of the show - when I woke up to an email that said, "Ticket acquired and I'm looking to see if I can get another one!"  By noon, two.  Well there was a student sitting in front of me when I got the news so I asked her: "Hay, you wanna see Oprah tonight?"  Response, "Ya not serious Miss. Who just sits there and asks someone that?" Ha!  I do!  And then I left the room to set up a surprise for the original person I was thinking of.  

If you have ever been in a HS school at lunch hour, it's sometimes hard to find a student. Announcements were made by multiple people, I asked classmates, other educators, other colleagues.  The hunt was on.  It was about to be perfect because as soon as she stepped back into the school, she became to receive the multiple messages that I was looking for her.  What is a student to conclude?  "I'm in trouble!"  So I might not actually be someone they will want to find.  Perfect!  When she did find me, I told her that I had to have a serious conversation with her.  That it was really important.  That we had to have in the office and her guidance counsellor had to join us.  When we got the office, a very nervous young lady, surrounded by several staff members: "I heard a rumour (smh) that you have been working really hard and some great things are happening for you as a result.  I believe that anyone who works hard, should be rewarded.  How would like to see Oprah tonight?"  

No words can do justice to her reaction.  She screamed, cried and then hugged everyone for several minutes!

Here's my best effort to capture what occurred for me:

"I can hardly function today I'm so high. Yesterday may have been the BEST day in recent memory in this building. I've been feeling so defeated watching everyday while this world chooses to treat the lives of black people like they have no value. I watch every day as black youth have their spirits snatched away because someone else decided something for their lives. I notice how easy it is to put on my rose-coloured glass, to close my eyes because I feel overwhelmed by the work. The one thing that saves me every day - a commitment I made to myself when I sat in a room in 2002 and I embraced and surrendered my life to the conversation of the International Black Summit. The journey to me...is the most important one I walk. As a result, I can not ignore the little black girl or little black boy in me, who longs for someone to just notice! I am the one to do it and I do it for me! I am my vision fulfilled. I am who I've been waiting for. I am empowerment through laughter! It doesn't matter how many times I screw this up, moments like yesterday remind what I've sometimes heard repeated by addicts of all kinds: "Your always chasing that first high." When you feel the high of seeing the world open up for a young adult, there is no better feeling like it. 

 I will chase that high for the rest of my life even if someone said, I can't ever have it again.  My vision is my drug!"

I didn't need to see Oprah that night.  I saw Rochelle and Tshanda and as a result I saw me.  On the way to the show, we laughed, we talked about how Oprah and Madame CJ Walker are linked.  We were happy!  They shared with the poem Oprah shared in gratitude for what they experienced.  Others shared it with me too but the message I got from them is that they NOTICED and knew that poem was for me.  A gift I can never repay except to be my vision fulfilled!

Love After Love

by Derek Walcott

The time will come

when, with elation 

you will greet yourself arriving 

at your own door, in your own mirror 

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat. 

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart 

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored 

for another, who knows you by heart. 

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes, 

peel your own image from the mirror. 

Sit. 

Feast on your life.