She was a little girl watching us in a Bara village in Madagascar fourteen years ago. She was shy, but braver than her brother.
My own daughters have grown up since I took this photo. They've graduated from universities with advanced degrees, and are working to ensure that they provide their children with a future planet they'd choose to inherit...not one they're forced to endure.
They are better people than I am.
There is so much joy in taking our children to the pathways that lead to choices followed by more choices, not to dead-ends and brick walls.
But how have my choices over my 67 years of living on Earth defined the path of my little Bara girl's life?
So many of us in the developed world think of ourselves as having advanced far
from tribalism like that of the Bara people, but is our own behavior not tribal when we pay little heed to other nations, cultures, and species? Have we forgotten that the concept of original sin is based on our elevation of ourselves above all, seeking to be superior, to become masters?