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     In Our Togetherness, Castles Are Built  !      

                             —Irish Proverb

Dear community members,

As we gather to inspire each other and take delight in language learning, we have received a heart-warming greeting from Robin, our forever passionate and uplifting English instructor from the land of the maple leaf.

Hello! Welcome! This is a bit odd, isn't it? Like everything these days, I guess. I should have met you already-in our lecture theatre, all of us together there on a late February day, on what I choose to imagine was a sunny morning... Instead, here I am, still dislocated in time and place – not standing at the front of that familiar room, looking out at all of you looking back at me. I am typing and recording for your elsewhere eyes and ears, and there you all are – each by each and one by one, because togetherness has become complicated. That humble adverb – together – has become virtual, conceptual, condensed, conspired against, longed for, within our grasp, and just beyond our reach. A sudden sweep of disease from hand to hand – and the world we knew is unmade; to be ‘together’ now is a lonely endeavour containing multitudes.

At this point I should tell you that these things I write for these occasions actually write themselves and
occasionally a bit of a language lesson creeps in. I like to have a word in my pocket to inspire the rest, and in
this exact unspecified moment where we all are and are not gathered – one word made itself seen: that humble adverb, now at the heart of everything and just as suddenly – gone. In my pocket is the word,‘together’. Together in our apartness, let us take a moment right here – for all that the whole world has been and is going through. There are still so many people I love on the other side of the world, sheltered in place and stopped in time, as we all were here in January, into February and well beyond. The whole world is still holding its breath – what next? When will we all be together?

Since that early New Year’s hour, returning by taxi from a long cozy Spring Festival supper with family, I – like you - we in our tens of millions have been tucked away, motionless, listening to birds on the wire tell stories, because these days – stories come to us. I heard a story about delivery workers in Wuhan who became famous for such love of others they would go to extraordinary lengths to rescue lonely unfed cats whose persons were in hospital. Each by each and one to one – I heard and keep hearing such stories of love and care in the midst of loss and fear – nurses, doctors, cleaners, drivers, and volunteers - all as brave as the bravest soldiers – all together. I was and am in awe of the capacity and power of human tenderness. Parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles, children, sisters, brothers – all scattered and frozen in place, all apart, and all together... I was and remain in awe of the patience and extended reach of ordinary acts of love among neighbours. We must keep feeding each other and be reminded of how it keeps our own hearts beating.

I hear a lot of hard stories too, from those birds on the wire. Suspicions large and small go everywhere with this virus. We have also grown afraid of being together. Everywhere we have become wary of our borders. Everywhere we hear a lot of hard talk about ‘us’ and ‘them’. I won’t mince words about it. What ignorance and fear will do – let loose in the world at this moment – must be turned away each by each and one by one. We are each responsible for our own heart. We each choose what stones we are carrying when we meet with
others on our road together. We can get rid of all our stones. We can carry bread and flowers instead. Together has its Old English root which we can only guess at pronouncing, ‘togædere’, "so as to be present in one place, in a group...”...In reference to singleness, "so as to be unified or integrated...”That verb, ‘to gather’   is a close relative of ‘together’. The dictionary I consulted tells me – we gather flowers, ...thoughts, and persons. We gather flowers, thoughts, and persons, together. There is poetry in dictionaries...
 

I say welcome, then – together! I’ll meet you as soon as we’re all able. Until we are, with patience and persistence, you’ll gather your own words, each by each and one by one. When the world comes together again, slowly as it must, after much study and hard work to make ready, when all those flowers, thoughts, and persons move toward each other again, you too may join them. Each by each and one by one we may listen and hear what another has to say without picking up new stones – or old stones. We may share our bread and flowers – together – having emptied our pockets of stones.    

播放音乐：Robin's greeting