School Essay

This i believe: thoughtfulness and gentleness are precious virtues, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Consider the worm: it is small, it is ugly, it doesn’t even know it's alive. The worm is sacred. The worm knows that it wants moisture so it wriggles onto the sidewalk because it is so stupid it doesn’t understand that it will die. And so this slice of star dust - granted somehow with the perfect electrical wiring to be living - gets stepped on and dries out in the sun.

And the people keep walking by and silently remark about how gross that is, that the worm is so stupid. I'm not innocent.

Well, the worm never hurt anybody; in the food chain it is a producer. The worm is alive and in return it gives life! The worm is an artist. Nobody seems to appreciate the worm's gifts; they believe that the gifts are ugly. They call it mulch. The worm has no words to explain how much it loves the earth. And while the worm may be nervous around other creatures, it loves them just as infinitely. Even if they inevitably feast on its flesh.

And it is so vital to be thoughtful and gentle. Watch the sidewalk on a rainy day because a fellow earthling might be there having the time of its life. Make yourself useful: put it back in the grass. Watch it slip down into the earth and be proud. Even if a little roomful of people decide to save its little life that means more creatures might have a chance to do something great, wander around endlessly because it is beautiful to be alive.

The fellow earthling might be one of your own. A person, that is. Remember that that person might love you just as infinitely as it loves the earth and you owe everybody the same amount of grace even when it’s frustrating.

The worm is frustrated. It has to clamber through soil all day. Its only chance to ever feel the wind from the inside of a bird’s beak. And the bird is frustrated that it must forever eat worms. And all the people are frustrated that no one understands.

I’m frustrated because it seems all we see in the world is cruelty. All around, every day, people not caring about the person next to them. Not caring about the earth under them, delivering bombs to children’s houses for existing wrong. For forgetting that there are neurons inside your brain that are full of chemicals. For forgetting that everything is sacred.

No one is better than anybody else. I'm probably worse than most people. Maybe you are too, it's not a contest. Just be thoughtful and gentle of the living things around you. It's your only chance. The worms will thank you.