On Easter Sunday, Sue Silverstein, a teacher at Bishop Maginn High School, met an older man at a supermarket. He seemed sad and lost. She asked him what was strong, and he said he always spends Easter Sunday at his Senior Center, but it was closed down this year because of the coronavirus.

He said he was lonely and by himself – he has no family living any longer – and he came to the supermarket looking for a chocolate Easter Bunny, something his wife always gave him on Easter when she was alive.

Sue got the man’s address and offered to help him.

She asked her mobile Google classroom – all students from Bishop Maginn at home and quarantined – to take up the task of bringing comfort to the isolated in any way they could think of.

Christer Htoo, a senior (the Army of Good paid her tuition earlier this year, thanks), created a video of her singing a song to spread her love.

I know Christer well; she was in a refugee camp for more than a decade, she and her family survived the Myanmar genocide. She and her twin sister are incredibly sweet and generous, good friends to me, and Zinnia (especially Zinnia). Their compassion belies their awful experiences.

Christer went home and made a video of her singing this song. She says it speaks of how one generation learns from another generation that came before it and learned how to stay close to God’s love in the face of loneliness.

Christer is going to college this Fall; it saddens her to think that she will miss graduation and the Senior Prom, both of which she was looking forward to. She told me she loved every day she spent at Bishop Maginn (until us, the twins could never pay tuition) and will miss it greatly; she said going there helped her to forget the violence and the hard life in the refugee camps.

We brought special ribbons for her, and a scarf that signifies academic achievement in her culture.

The video has been forward to the man, Christer hopes it will bring him comfort.

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Note: I’m going to be teaching my Writing Workshop online via Bishop Maginn High School’s mobile Google classroom. I’ll be resuming the class for once a week live writing discussions and editing sessions. I feel good at being able to interact with these gifted students and stay in touch with them.

They are pretty fine writers also.