A Tale of Two Sunrises

Wendi Pillars
Jul 25, 2017 · 2 min read

The scene: Myrtle Beach, 6:22am, Day One

Picture it. The pre-sunrise. Oranges, reds, pinks, and tinges of blues. Intensifying, slowly, slowly, slowly, until there she peeks. The orangish pink sun rises gracefully above the horizon in vivid glory. People line the sandy shore, smartphones in hand, taking pictures of each other with the sunrise background, or the sunrise alone. Breathtaking beyond words.

Sunrise at Myrtle Beach, SC. July 22, 2017

The scene: Myrtle Beach, 6:24am, Day Two

2 minutes later than the previous day, and an infinite measure of difference. I saw not one other person taking a picture this morning. There were plenty of people on the beach, but glances at the rising sun convinced them that it wasn’t quite worth a digital memory. On the other hand, they were digging in the sand, talking to each other, looking around, and even getting into the water.

Sunrise at Myrtle Beach, SC. July 23, 2017

Hmmm….not unlike teaching, is it? We see the bells and whistles, are attracted by the shiny new things, the “spectacular” and dramatic which can be tweeted, instagrammed, and blogged about. All the while, the majority of the daily work is beautiful in its own right, with a consistency that belies incredible underlying processes. Myriad forces ensure the successful rise of that sun, and if we stop to think about them — even a portion of them — we gain a whole new respect for the undramatic, the consistent, the small bits that add up to create the whole.

What if…. we considered our students in the same light? Wouldn’t every rise be beautiful?

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