29 May 2011

Marc Daniels                                                                                                                     Weed Out Hate Sow Seeds of Love

Dear Marc,

            Since the Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend in Times Square at the Reuter’s News Building in New York City there has been much positive response.  I still cannot believe that you were able to get your event up on the Reuter’s flashing news billboard for the length of time they did this for us – a tribute to the power of the message your work bears. Imagine the millions who saw it!

All the Waldorf Schools who received the seeds gave them away or planted them in many creative forms.  One of the best was the Waldorf School of Baltimore who gave each participant at their annual Civil Rights lunch a beautiful packet of the “Seeds of Peace.”  The crowd was delighted and the seeds prompted beautiful metaphors, evidently, of deep roots and luxurious growth. Many Waldorf teachers planted the seeds and are still watching them grow into magnificent sun flowers.

The students and the teachers at the New York City Steiner School were particularly pleased at your including them in the event at Times Square on the very day of the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday.  The event gave them a sense of participating in history in a unique way.  It also summoned the students, as your good words do, to fulfill the dream of human collaboration and harmony started, and labored and pleaded for by Dr. King.  The sacrifice of his life is the most potent seed of all and the students realized this because of your good work.

There have been a half dozen or so requests long after the event was completed, Marc, for the seeds or to participate.  Though it is hard to explain that the event itself is completed, it is a good sign that the interest you sparked is still keen and ongoing.  The seeds are all given out but the imperative remains to invent many ways to “weed out hate; sow seeds of love.”  May we all do that, now and ever after!

My gratitude to you is enormous, Marc.  Including the Waldorf Schools of North America in your plans was a remarkably generous and fruitful thing.

                                                                        With warm thanks,

                                                                                    Patrice Maynard