AuburnChick's Adventures

It’s late, but here I sit…catching up on DWTS…watching the episode that I DVR’d earlier.

As I listened to Hope Solo’s personal story…her troubled childhood and her struggles to reconnect with her father…her ups and downs in her soccer career…I was moved…to tears in fact.

And then I think back to earlier in the evening when I watched the national news and, specifically, the incredibly shocking story about Penn State’s coaching controversy.

That story both sickens and saddens me.

I was reminded that everyone has a story.

We have moments that define us.

I can’t help but wonder if it is only in the darkest times that our truest characters are pounded out.

The way I look at it, happy times of celebration end in the blink of an eye; whereas, strenuous times of struggle seem to last forever, thus imposing upon us longer-lasting…if not permanent…impressions upon our lives.

I look at the young students I teach, and I listen to their stories.

They are shocking, and they are heartbreaking.

I often wonder how kids that young can endure such hardships…difficult circumstances that have left indelible marks upon their spirits.

And then I reflect back on my own childhood…fraught with its own dark, lonely years and experiences.

It is then that I realize that it was in those times when much of my life was defined.

Just as it is in my students’ lives.

And just as it has been in these stars’ and athletes’ lives.

How will these moments define us?

These are choices that we all must make as we decide how to play the hands we’re dealt.

Filed under: This-n-That |