Or was it an angel unaware?
By: Norma Adams-Wade
“No man is an island.
No man stands alone.
Each man’s joy is joy to me.
Each man’s grief is my own.
We need one another.
So, I will defend
Each man as my brother.
Each man as my friend.”
17th CenturyPoet John Donne and 1968 songwriters Joan Baez & Peter Schickele
“I can do it myself!”
What parent has not heard that objection from a precocious toddler determined to be independent?
The universal question is, though, how many of us adults still declare stubbornly: “I can do it myself,” after a spouse, partner, or friend deserts us?
Aloneness, independence, or loneliness can be construed in many different ways. But 17th Century prose writer John Donne and modern-day songwriters Joan Baez and Peter Schickele had it right when they stated : “No man is an island.”
There are news stories of individuals who live alone for decades on isolated islands. But those situations are rare, and the songwriters are indeed correct that “we need one another.”
I have written before about the important role educators play in teaching us what we know. And I have lamented the pittance pay educators receive compared to the vastly-larger salaries many of their students earn out in the world after the student leaves the teacher behind in the classroom. The educators were the master craftsmen/women. We were the apprentices.
Yet, today, in so many ways, society has fallen apart. And much of a new generation no longer learns life lessons and values – how to dress, respect, budget, fix things that break, how to keep the family together, how to find middle ground in a dispute, how to teach angry teenagers to exchange a few punches and live another day, rather than turn to deadly weapons and permanently end their promising future.
The pairing of a craftsman and apprentice has its value in passing alone a learned craft. Reading instructions in a book is one thing. But I argue that leaning over someone’s shoulder to observe their handiwork can be far better.
It’s hard to beat passing on tradition. A family member who can say they learned the family’s secret recipe by watching grandma skillfully prepare the concoction wins the contest each time.
I was just thinking…what if we as a society cared enough to each adopt an apprentice youth to figuratively harness to our chest and pour into that malleable brain all the right decisions, opinions, reactions and safeguards needed to maneuver through the rest of their life?
With every conflict, challenge, battle and victory, that young brain would have a built-in guide to show them the way and help them manage their emotions.
We speak eloquently of dreams of a better life for humankind – marked by less violence, less hate, less crime, less bitterness, jealousy, envy, complaints, injustice, cheating, abuse, temptation, shame, ridicule, embarrassment … the list goes on.
But just what if each of us as an adult-in-training was under our own master craftsman/woman? That skilled authority would already have made all the mistakes and learned from them, and thus had become the plateau we hoped to reach.
Back in the day, school students took courses that included woodshop, sewing, cooking, auto mechanics, junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) and National Defense Cadet Corps (NDCC) training.
Credit: Tish Farrell.
These educational offerings were a productive haven for students not interested in book learning and who leaned toward hands-on training.
Key components of these trainings were the master craftsmen/women who bend their shoulders so a student could look over them.
We could long for the days of apprentice training. We could argue that society would be a more productive place as a result. Finishing high school could lead right into a field that would allow the graduate to support themselves and start a family early should they so desire.
No worry about paying for a college education over a lengthy four-year stretch.
The master craftsmen, journeymen/women could be considered the angels unaware. Stories of angels often end with the teller admitting that they never got to thank the person that saved them from tragedy. That angel disappeared around the corner or into the night, never to be seen again.
That’s what angels do. They help, then quietly disappear. It’s sort of like the old mask-wearing Lone Ranger television movie character. After aiding the townspeople, he rode his horse Silver off into the distance as the residents asked, “Who was that masked man?” The Lone Ranger’s Native American sidekick Tonto was left to explain who the hero was.
Who was your Lone Ranger or master craftsman/woman who led you on your apprentice journey to adulthood? Did you read in a book how to tie your shoes or brush your teeth? Or did an angel or master craftsman/women demonstrate the art to you? Yes, “we need one another. So, I will defend. Each man as my brother. Each man as my friend.”
Norma Adams-Wade, is a proud Dallas native, University of Texas at Austin journalism graduate and retired Dallas Morning News senior staff writer. She is a founder of the National Association of Black Journalists. norma_adams_wade@yahoo.com.
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