What’s Really Important

What’s really important. 

I’ve always been pretty amazed at school bus drivers, and know for a fact that I could never do their job. It’s not that I couldn’t actually learn to drive a bus, because I think I could. It’s the responsibility of insuring that the precious cargo on board gets to where they are going safely that holds me back. 

At heart I’m cautious by nature, and the bravery needed to drive a school bus doesn’t seem to be in my nature. The other day I learned about a school bus driver in Dallas who is making a difference in the lives of the children who are passengers on his bus each day. 

Curtis Jenkin’s  job in the eyes of the world may not seem as important as the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, or a Supreme Court Justice, or even a brain surgeon, however, I think his job is equally if not more important. 

What Curtis has done is take an important responsibility, and has elevated it even more by reaching out to the individual children he transports. He has gone the extra mile to instil character and kindness in each one. His daily interaction helps to motivate them as they step off his bus getting ready to take on the demands of their day. 

As they interviewed children who rode his bus, one young man relayed that Curtis was the father he wished he had. Another one of his riders, a budding young writer, displayed the custom t-shirt that John has given her bearing the actual book she had written. 

Curtis’ smile, kind words, and encouragement had created a family of bus riders who did not spend their time together bullying and harassing. Rather, they had learned to care for each other as valuable members of their school community. I’m sure this carried on into their classroom as well. 

Sometimes we think that our role in society is not important enough to even be considered as having value. Curtis has proved this not to be true. We are capable of elevating whatever we do to a higher level when we reach out with kindness and enthusiasm. 

I’d like to dedicate this posting to Sally Beahm, Ricky Beeler, and Fred Clifton, three other bus drivers who made a difference in the lives of children they cared for. 

“Not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love.”

Mother Teresa