by Stamatia Stamati

 

July 8, 2018. Sunday.

A beautiful cool day with a blue sky. Serenity everywhere.

Mata is on the balcony of her house. She takes care of her colorful flowers and inhale with deep breaths their aroma. Then she sits in the chair, spreads her hand to take a few juicy cherries from the bowl. The book is waiting for her to flip it.

But she changes her mind. She wants to enjoy the beauty of nature and the city together.

She pins her gaze at the forest opposite. So much beauty does not fit in her eyes! The tops of the trees are embraced by the sky!

She thinks an idea. She takes her magical pencil and draws three bubbles in the background she sees in front of her! Immediately these appeared in the sky! She smiles.

Her pencil still does its job well. It can paint what she wants with it. It can extinguish everything she wants. And immediately her design gets flesh and bones. But only for 10 minutes. Then it disappears. These 10 minutes, however, are enough to change the world around her.

She draws a dustbin on the street corner clean with all the rubbish inside. Immediately, the garbage that was out, disappears.

She draws a lovely graffitti on a wall of a half-broken house that looks to her right: A girl reading a book with wings and this lifts her a little from the ground.

She draws more trees and flowers in the yard of the school opposite her. The school became more joyful and bright space.

But all this is seen only by her. And they only last for 10 minutes. But she is not worried. She knows that when the schools open in September, her pencil will lead the children to new improved realities. She will teach them how to think, that the world is multidimensional, that there are no one-way thought and action, how to understand situations through different perspectives. In the classroom, they will all see the world as they want it, with critical thinking and awareness of identity and otherness.

Last year, the pencil painted a lot and traveled them everywhere: Cultural Heritage, Traditional Songs-Dances, Books, Musics of the World, Fantastic Stories, Famous People, Healthy Diet, Digital World. She will not forget the eyes of her students, which were shining with the worlds that spread in front of them.

This will also be the goal this year: To make them imagine a better state of affairs, to build their own place for the world through the willingness to change and through personal involvement.

Mata is looking forward to it!