Dear Parents, Caregivers and Friends of St Mary’s School,

I was at a function recently where a man told a very insightful story.

"A young man returned to attend his secondary school fair after leaving a few years earlier.

On arriving he saw his old headmaster working on a stall. Immediately he became overwhelmed with guilt. He approached his old teacher and said "Excuse me headmaster, do you remember me?" "Yes I remember you, how are you," was the reply.

"Headmaster I need to talk to you privately for a moment", the young man said. "Can you come over here?" The headmaster followed the young man over to a quiet place and the young man said "headmaster do you remember several years ago when a terrible story was going around about you?" The headmaster said, "Yes that story was proven to be a lie but it still caused a huge amount of pain and hurt to me, my family and the school." The boy said, "Headmaster it was me who made up the story and I am so sorry. I just want you to know that I will never do anything like it again."

The headmaster looked at the young man for a moment and said "Follow me". The young man followed the headmaster and as the headmaster strode past, he grabbed a handful of inflated helium balloons, dropped a handful on money on the counter and strode on. As the young man followed the headmaster they walk across the field, up to the high school bell tower, up the stairs to the platform at the top. When the young man had joined him the headmaster said, "You said that you were sorry and you wanted to make things right. Well O.K. bring these balloons back to me!" On saying this he released the balloons. A wind immediately caught them and they soared up into the air, scattering in all directions. "Headmaster I can never catch up and bring all of those balloons back, it’s impossible" the young man said.

"That’s what happens when you tell lies or gossip," the headmaster said. "Once it’s said you can never undo or bring it back"!

He looked at the young man and said, "I can see that you are sorry and I hope you have learned something. Lies and gossip are like the balloons in the wind, they scatter and go in all directions, and they are impossible to take back!"

Have a great week

—Mike Brosnahan