The day may begin with an orderly list of meetings and priorities. Then a shoe goes missing, a classroom needs help, a student has something important to share, and someone asks a question that begins with, ‘This may sound strange, but…’
The interruptions are not separate from the work. Very often, they are the work. They reveal what people need, what matters today, and where our presence can make a difference.
That does not mean every interruption is delightful. It means we can hold the weight of the work without missing its humanity. Every now and then, though, something so unexpected happens that the schedule simply has to wait. A parakeet once landed on a teacher’s head and was brought to the office, where it spent the next little while moving from shoulder to shoulder and even joined us for a meeting. Eventually, the owner arrived to take it home, and the office returned to normal, although the meeting was considerably more memorable than anyone had expected.
