Another month has passed since the last time I had to write this column. To be honest, if I thought that last month was difficult, this month was even harder. Why? Well, because life is pretty tough right now. We are living in a world that is filled with so many questions: When can we stop social-distancing? When will I go back to work? Will schools return to normal? When can I go to my favorite restaurant? Will I be able to pay my bills? What if I get sick, who will take care of my kids? And so on, and so on.

We live in a world where we “want, need and feel we deserve” answers. We live in a society of immediacy. People want you to answer their email, text, phone call right now. They wanted these answers five minutes ago. If you haven’t figured it out yet, that world of having all of our questions answered has disappeared … for now.

One thing I realized about being a principal is that I really like to know the answers. I feel obliged to know all the answers, and I need to communicate the answers to you in a timely manner. This allows you to get it into your calendars and the busy plans that each and every one of us have. I have lived in a level of frustration, anger and resentment in the past weeks. I have felt “inadequate” because I cannot deliver the answers that my employees, school parents and students need. I have found myself buried in work, Zoom meeting after Zoom meeting. Days get chewed up on a lot of discussions that revolve around questions that no one has any answers for. 

I discovered that our country was in the same boat. People demand answers to their questions, but guess what? No one has all of the answers. People don’t have the answers that we need. Then I observed the anger and hate boil up in areas around our country. It made me so sad. We have been faced with an unprecedented event in our history, and how will the history books in the future record our response to this event?

During one of the hundreds of Zoom meetings I have had in the past month, one of my colleagues, who was retiring, shared the quote from Maya Angelou that she inspired her during her time in education:

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

When I heard these words I remembered, this exact quote was given to me by one of our former families at St. Victor School. I have it hanging in my kitchen. Here was my answer to all of these questions that I don’t (as principal) have answers for.

It is not going to be what I said, or what I did, but it is how I make them feel. This is the answer to how we write our response to this pandemic. We need to make sure that we take care of each other. That we make people feel heard, loved and respected (even if they have a differing opinion). We need to make sure that we know that each and every single person in our world is essential. We all have a purpose and plan on this Earth and it seems that in some of the dark desperate times we lose sight of what that plan and purpose is. 

Although many questions we cannot answer, we can answer this one: How will we get through this difficult time in our lives? We get through it together. We get through it by making people feel that they are loved and more importantly essential to each and every one of us. 

For a society that needs, wants and deserves answers, here is the final question for you to think about today. How are you making those around you feel? Because guess what? That is how you will be remembered. 

— Joe Peters is the principal at St. Victor School in Monroe. He can be reached at joepeters@stvictormonroe.org.