Seeing Pink in Tree Bark

“Seeing the color of tree bark (it really does have pink in it!)”
One of the most important lessons that I learned in high school was during an art class when my instructor asked me to really look at the color in the tree bark. He made me realize that despite my pre-conceived notions that bark was brown and gray, there really is pink in it. Sometimes when I would really stop and look at my children I would see them differently–not as I imagined them but as they were trying to tell me whom they were. Listening to my 3 year old son ask me “who is sleeping here” while I struggled to clean a flower bed, I realized that the phrases and words that I take for granted had a different meaning to him. I told him that the tulips were sleeping there but would awaken soon. The next time he asked me a question I couldn’t understand I “listened” again to our conversation and understood his point of view better.