When I was little, I attended public elementary school. I took the bus to and from school everyday with my little brother until about fourth grade when my mother decided we were responsible enough to walk. My friends were bused in from all districts of the city of Lowell, but none the less we all played together on the playground. I remember being jealous of some of my friends who received a chocolate chip muffin before school every morning. I did not understand back then that I was fortunate enough to have had breakfast already. I did not understand that they lacked that privilege.

Around Christmas time every year, my mom used to buy extra hats and gloves and tell me to take them to school. My teacher would smile when I brought them to her and would ask me if I would be willing to share those gifts with some of my classmates. The pride that beamed in her eyes drove me to say yes--but I did not donate because I wanted to keep my classmates warm--I donated because I liked seeing my teacher smile. So much ignorance--I saw so little that separated me and the little girl I sat next to in class who did not own a pair of gloves. We both loved reading Junie B Jones and we both liked to play four square at recess. As far as I was concerned, she and I were best friends.

Last year, on MLK Day, I was a part of a group of students who participated in an exercise called Walk the Line. In short, the point of the exercise was to help you understand what it meant to be fortunate. The leader of the exercise read aloud either a blessing or a misfortune, and you were asked to take a step forward or backward if the statement applied to you, respectively. Step forward if you had more than thirty books in your house growing up. Step backward if you hold a job during the school year. Statement after statement, they separated us--rich and poor, black and white, straight and gay.

I like to think my parents raised me well. From the time I was eight I always did my homework independently and folded my own laundry, not with the expectations of a reward, but because that's what was expected of me. I helped my mom with my three little siblings because I was the oldest. I called my friends parents Mr. and Mrs. because it was good manners, and I never stared at strangers because that was impolite. Sure, I fought with my little brother when we were little and I was a pain when it came to letting my mom pick out my clothes before school in the morning, but I was always respectful of my authority figures and my classmates.

I think the little girl in my class without gloves and I got along so well because we were raised with those same basic principles. We shared interests. I did not see her lack of gloves as anything more than what it was-- a lack of gloves. There was no sense of superiority or uncomfortableness between us. To be completely honest, I don't know when the separation occurred. I recognized it when I Walked the Line, but I knew it before that day. I can't remember when I really learned why the children got chocolate chip muffins in the morning, or why my mom sent me to school with extra hats and gloves. I just know that I was once ignorant to the separation and now I am not.

"I note the obvious differences
in the human family.
Some of us are serious,
some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived
as true profundity,
and others claim they really live
the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones
can confuse, bemuse, delight,
brown and pink and beige and purple,
tan and blue and white.

I've sailed upon the seven seas
and stopped in every land,
I've seen the wonders of the world
not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women
called Jane and Mary Jane,
but I've not seen any two
who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different
although their features jibe,
and lovers think quite different thoughts
while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,
we weep on England's moors,
and laugh and moan in Guinea,
and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,
are born and die in Maine.
In minor ways we differ,
in major we're the same.

I note the obvious differences
between each sort and type,
but we are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike."

-Maya Anelou