Lessons from a Willful Five-Year-Old By Janet Bisti There are women in my life, women who I’ve never even met, who give me inspiration every day. Women like Sylvia Plath who, despite her depression, or maybe because of it, found beauty and life in her writing. Women like Victoria Woodhull, who didn’t let a simple thing like the right to vote stop her from running for president. And women like Jane Austin, whose stories shaped my imagination growing up. But perhaps most inspirational was my own great grandmother whose quiet childhood determination (or stubbornness, depending on who is telling the story) has been the grounding lesson of my educational leadership journey. Her story, one which was passed down from generation to generation, takes place on a large farm in the Midwest, where my great grandmother’s family grew wheat and corn. The farm, like many of that time, had a small collection of pigs, cows, and chickens in addition to the tools of large-scale harvesting of wheat and corn. It was the original self-sustaining off-the-grid homestead. But what my grandmother loved most about living on the farm was the big draft horses used to drag the plows. Here my father, who often told me this story, would explain the size of these horses. My small mind couldn’t fully comprehend, having not grown up on a farm or near these massively beautiful beasts, so let me just say they are BIG. Like, really big. They are strong, powerful animals and do not care about what small human may be hanging around them. My great grandmother had very strict orders to stay away from the horses, particularly when unsupervised: They were dangerous, and expensive, and both she and they could get hurt. Well, this rule was, obviously, impossible for my great grandmother to follow. I mean, who doesn’t want a pony, am I right? Plus, the horses were always so gentle when she was allowed near them, eating apples out of her hand with such care, their soft lips tickling the palm of her hand. And they were always under the control of their handlers. Surely, her mother was being over protective. One afternoon, my great grandmother was dutifully completing her chore of feeding the chickens when she found herself unusually alone, with no grownups in sight. Not to let such an opportunity go to waste, she
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