Wednesday night I walked into a high school hallway transformed.
The students of our local high school had turned their hallways and classrooms into a celebration of Hispanic and Latino culture — language, art, history. Not as a project to be graded. As an offering. Made possible in part by a grant from the Estes Park Education Foundation, they called it Paper Bridges — and if you have a few minutes, I hope you’ll explore what they built. It is full of photos, stories, learning, and videos that will take your breath away.
And then Thursday morning I woke to the news: another shooting, this time at Old Dominion. A synagogue threatened. The war raging on. And I found myself holding the other night’s beauty against the morning’s headlines, wondering what to say to you.
I met a senior named Willow. She was working on a large wood burning — intricate, patient work — with a deer at the center. She told me about the deer — a major symbol in Mexican folklore representing our connection to spirits and to ourselves. A guide for those who are lost. Wisdom, divinity, fertility, abundance. And surrounding the deer, sixteen marigolds in a circle — the symbol of life and death. She said I could share her work, and I’m grateful, because I think you need to see it.
A young man dressed as Frida Kahlo sat at a table sharing art and stories — when I asked which story was his favorite, he lit up talking about the pole that went all the way through her stomach. A video made by neurodivergent students played nearby — glorious, peaceful, Monarch butterflies drifting across the screen. It was evening, so only a handful of students were there to share their work, which made it feel even more intimate.
One student, who had been struggling to find her footing, was asked to be the project manager — and rose to it. At their celebration huddle, every student clapped and cheered for her leadership, and she beamed. Another student, who couldn’t engage with art in conventional ways, built a Lego model of ancient ruins — because the teacher found a way in. Throughout the whole project, these students had affirmed each other, encouraged each other, drawn each other out.
Every one of these moments was an act of listening.
Not listening in the passive sense. Listening as a practice. As a choice. The teacher who looked at the struggling kid and didn’t see a problem to manage but a person to draw out. The student who spent hours burning a deer into wood because she felt something sacred in the symbol and wanted to honor it. The young people who dressed up, showed up, built something together across every kind of difference.
This is what I believe: the divinity lives in each and every one of us. And part of awakening to that truth is recognizing that we are precious in our diversity — not threatened by it, but made more whole by it.
I know the old world is loud right now. I know it is ugly. The headlines tell us so every single day. And I am not going to pretend that looking away is an option, or that hope is easy.
But I will tell you what I saw last night: a hallway full of young people who had chosen connection over disconnection. Who had chosen to learn and understand rather than to turn away. Who were finding voice — their own and each other’s — one careful, creative act at a time.
That is what is being born, even now. Especially now.
One step. One pause. One moment of genuine care about how to engage, how to listen, how to draw out and celebrate what lives in the person beside you.
That is the work. Every one of us. With our water, our trees, our animals, our neighbors, the stranger. Even — and this is the hardest part — staying curious about why someone’s heart has hardened enough to find joy in the hurt of others. Because coming home to ourselves means all of us coming home.
Over the weekend we attended yet another stunning performance by the Boulder Ballet. Afterward, the director talked about how we mirror each other — how when dancers fold in and close, the audience closes too. It’s contagious. But so is the leap. When a dancer opens wide across the stage, something in us opens with them. Our very posture toward each other matters. Openness begets openness.
That’s what I saw in that hallway. Young people leaping.
The old world is falling away. It is loud and it is painful. But last night, in a high school hallway, I caught a glimpse of what is rising to take its place.
And it looked like a deer burned into wood by steady, careful hands.
I’d love to know — where are you seeing it? The opening. The leap. The quiet acts of connection that don’t make the headlines but are changing everything. Comment or reply and share what is moving in you.
Elizabeth Jameson is an ordained Episcopal priest, writer, retreat leader, and soul companion. For those who feel drawn to explore existential and spiritual questions more deeply, Jameson offers opportunities—both in Estes Park and online—to delve into them through shared reflection and practice. These are not programs so much as paths of attention and discernment, for those who find resonance. Jameson can be reached through her website, Broken Open, or her Substack site.
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