“Back to school”…the three words most dreaded by school aged children across the globe. I remember how the Fall catalog from JC Penney, with all the autumnal plaids and corduroy, would strike anxiety into my heart as soon as the mailman delivered it. But amidst the fear and loathing, there was also the smallest glimmer of excitement and anticipation. Re-uniting with old friends, seeing the boy you like, getting a whole new wardrobe and…..of course….SCHOOL SUPPLIES!!!!!!. There is nothing that screams possibility and promise more than a brand new, completely blank, unmarred, pristine, composition notebook!
And now, years later, and long since I have had to return to school myself, I still feel like September, more than even January, is a time of new beginnings. A time to begin again. A time to clear away the clutter, and start out fresh…maybe re-invent myself in some ways…turn over a Fall Leaf, so to speak.
For the better part of the last 35 years, that has meant a return to the MYP for me, too. And there is something of a comfort to return to the group. To mingle with kindred spirits. To immediately know, even if there are new comers, or faces you don’t recognize, that these people are family. We are connected by the group, but more importantly by a common faith, a shared understanding of the world, the same moral compass and the same God who is Father to us all.
I have been a teen in the program, a supporter of the program, a team member in the program, and now a parent of a teen in the program, and throughout all these years, coming back to the MYP for opening day in September is still, and will always be, Homecoming.