Angels In The Hallways

On Friday night, the Ridgewood Avenue School (RAS) hosted a "Global Expo," featuring singing and dancing from around the world in the auditorium, a "Parade of Nations," with kids dressed up in clothes that reflected their heritage, and crafts and food from around the globe. There were many different cultures being celebrated in my town, which at first glance seems white and homogenized. At one point in the auditorium, Dalia, a lush belly dancer, writhed on the stage, while a mosh pit of screaming 9 - 12 year old girls danced along with her, squealing in delight. The juxtaposition of these knobbly kneed tweens, with their colt-like limbs, Hannah-Montana hairstyles and groovy clothes, idolizing a round, fleshy woman, made me smile. Could this one experience help some of these girls escape the body-image nightmare in which so many of us are mired?

Making this all happen was a team of parents, who had worked long and hard to plan, coordinate and carry out this event. I stood in the main hallway, watching excited children running from room to room, their energy crackling around them like sparks from 4th of July sparklers. Parents, weary from weeks of hard work, were virtually invisible to the happy children, but I saw their halos. They were the angels in the hallways, making school a happy paradise for one brief night.