By Dr. Kristen Paglia, Chief Executive Officer
Dear Team P.S. ARTS,
Jacob Campbell, P.S. ARTS Communications Associate, asked me if I would write a letter to our LA Marathon and LA Big 5K runners, walkers and supporters. He said he’d like to have it by the end of the day (to be fair, he actually asked me to do it over a week ago, but whatever, here we are). I was not feeling well today. I have some kind of a viral thing and a fever, so that’s part of it, but I was also feeling generally discouraged and sorry for myself. I spent a good twenty minutes this morning listing all the reasons everyone should be nicer to me: I’m sick. I work a lot. My husband works a lot. I don’t have enough time with my kids. My parents are getting older. You get it. I know you get it, because when I started listing it all out in my head, I realized pretty quickly I am describing… well, most of the people I know. Right after that humbling epiphany, it occurred to me that I was also describing the luckiest people I know, myself included. I said my list to myself again. I’m sick, which is annoying because I am usually healthy. I work a lot because I have a job I love and want to succeed at. My husband works a lot because he has a job he loves and wants to succeed at. I don’t have enough time to spend with my kids who are really great people to be around. My parents are getting older but they are still here for my kids to get to know and learn from.
I thought back to the recent P.S. ARTS Board of Trustees retreat. Our founder, Dr. Paul Cummins, was there to kick the day off. Dr. Cummins is a tireless world-mover, and, as I said at the retreat, an inspiration to me personally. He told us the P.S. ARTS origin story. It was a night he wasn’t feeling well. He didn’t want to go to a reception for new students at the school where he was Headmaster. His wife told him he couldn’t let the kids down, so Dr. Cummins pulled himself together and went. That was the night he met musician and philanthropist Herb Alpert, told him about the sad state of arts education in public schools, and started a philanthropic partnership that would eventually become the P.S. ARTS of today providing arts education to 20,000 students every single week. The moral of the story, said Dr. Cummins, is “Show up!”
So, I channeled my inner world-mover and opened up my computer to re-read what I had written on my marathon fundraising page way back when the idea of walking a marathon didn’t seem as crazy:
I said no to doing the LA Marathon a dozen times before I said yes. I was (and am) terrified that I won’t be able to make it, that I’ll be embarrassed, or that I will let down the kids I am trying to do right by. When I actually admitted that to myself, I realized that taking on challenges and forging ahead in spite of doubt is exactly what we at P.S. ARTS ask our students to do every single day — so, it’s my turn to (literally) walk my talk. I plan on walking the entire 26 miles alongside my husband and dear friends as a way of showing P.S. ARTS’ 20,000 young people that if you set your sights high, work hard, believe, lean on your friends (and be there when they need to lean back), you will succeed.
Sigh. Okay, okay! I get it, Universe. We ask these kids to show up, put themselves out there, and muster up confidence, positivity, and creativity every day. I encourage them to do these things, when they are hard for me, and I am, as we’ve established, one of the lucky ones! Sure, I have stress like we all have stress, but I have stress from my safe home in my safe neighborhood. I have stress with enough to eat everyday, reliable family and friends around me, and a body that does, at least, most of what I want it to do. A lot of the kids P.S. ARTS serves don’t have those things. A heartbreaking number don’t have them. So, no more feeling sorry for myself; I put on my shoes and I started walking. I walked ten miles, sweated the fever out (I hope), cleared my head, and, most important, I reminded myself of the whole reason I agreed to do this thing in the first place! That is, when I feel even a fraction of the grit and grace it takes for the students from the communities we serve to get to school every day, work hard, imagine, create, and do all the things we ask them to do in our arts classes — I know I can’t let anything stand in the way of doing my part to be sure they have those classes to go to. My part is the easier one by far. One foot in front of the other, I will finish this marathon alongside all of the other world-movers supporting P.S. ARTS and, together, we will make sure our kids are never without the opportunity and tools to make it to whatever finish line they can dream up.
