Photo via kudaker

"He so loved us that for our sake He was made man...Who made man; was created of a mother, whom He created; was carried by hands which He formed... cried in the manger in wordless infancy, He the Word without Whom all human eloquence is mute."
-Augustine, Sermon 188 2,2

You know that feeling of being caught in between?
The changing of season.

A new season of my life is on the horizon. But I'm not there yet.
Caught in the inbetween. The interim.

The literal seasons are in transition as well here on the mountain. I love walking through a blanket of yellow and red leaves on my way to class. The wet and the fog... the brisk, fresh air that steals your breath away. Yes, change is good.

One of my favorite things during this fallish-wintry time is falling asleep with the window cracked open. The air is so cold that our small dorm room is freezing by morning. But I love waking up to the feeling of the wind on my face (well, my forehead really... I'm usually so buried under the covers that that's all that's visible.)

Each morning I'm the first to wake up in our dorm room. Liv's alarm goes off around 7:00 next to my head. I groggily hand it to her and doze off for 20 more minutes. Then it's a test of self-control in order to hurry out of my cozy cocoon and tiptoe across the icy tiled floor into the adjoining room, so as not to wake my three slumbering roommates. You really have to approach the situation like you would ripping off a BandAid... just throw off the covers and run so that it's over quickly with the least amount of discomfort.

What's one of your favorite things about this time of transitioning seasons? You can interpret the question as literally or figuratively as you'd like :)

So, you've been wondering why all these Sesame Street characters have been woven into your Google homepage this week, eh?

Well, it just so happens to be the show's 40th Anniversary.

I was actually excited to see Cookie Monster stuffing himself in the center of my computer screen, because he's actually worked his way into my Senior Intergration Paper (SIP) this semester. Now what could Cookie Monster possibly have to do with my SIP topic on art as a means of healing and restoration? Well, I'll tell you...

        Since the very beginning, the preschool television show Sesame Street has been a  social activist force. “The show arrived on the heels of riots in Washington, Baltimore, Cleveland and Chicago, and the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr… It was intentional from the beginning to show different races living together,”[1] said David Kleeman, exectutive director of the American Center for Children and Media. By characterizing the show’s set with a lower-income, urban atmosphere, the show catered to a diverse group of preschoolers who needed to understand and visualize what a world without segregation could look like.

Forty years later, the children’s show has been broadcasted in an additional sixteen countries and regions around the world. However, Sesame doesn't "dump" Western culture into each country in which it is broadcasted, but it creates a specific curriculum to fit the context of each unique culture. The Sesame employees many times travel to an international location and rely on the locals. These local people are equipped to identify what issues need to be addressed and how the show should be presented so that the community will respond positively.

In Palestinian territory Kosovo, Sesame supported peace in the midst of Albanian and Serbian ethnic tension. The show aired clips of preschoolers from both ethnicities in an effort to educate the other group and to stir up empathy. In South Africa, Sesame introduced an HIV-positive Muppet to break the stigma and attitudes surrounding the AIDS issue there. But not only does Sesame address political issues, it meets difficult topics such as death head-on. In addition, the show regularly hosts children with illnesses and Down syndrome and has launched an obesity awareness campaign called Healthy Habitats for life.[2] The discernment and insight that Sesame has exhibited for the past forty years has surely been a large contributing factor to their international success. Since what the children see on the show reflects their own unique environment, Sesame proves to be and effective teaching tool.