Am I Brave?

Lois Lowry happens to be one of those authors where when you see the book is by them you know its going to be good.  Number the Stars is no exception.  This book proves once again that kids can handle more than we think they can.  Number the Stars is set in Copenhagen during WWII and it chronicles the life of Annemarie and her family as they do their part in helping their friends-who happen to be Jewish.  It is a tale of bravery, sacrifice, friendship, and hope and it is truly an amazing book.

Young Annemarie does not think that she is brave, "Annemarie admitted to herself, snuggling there in the quiet dark, that she was glad to be an ordinary person who would never be called upon for courage."  How many of us feel that way-glad that we are not the Harriet Tubmans or Oskar Schindlers of the world, glad to be ordinary.  Yet is anyone really ordinary?  Annemarie's uncle says it best, "I think that you are...frightened, but determined and if the time came to be brave I am quite sure you would be very very brave."

In fact when Annemarie is called upon she is brave, but she just sees it as doing what needed to be done-not brave because she was terrified the entire time.  (And that's all the detail you get because you really really should read this book). In fact I think many people do extraordinary things, and are very brave, but don't see it that way because they think they are just doing what needs to be done.  Annemarie's bravery looks extraordinary because she was living in an extraordinary time.  Yet our own time is no less extraordinary, so what can we do to be brave?

Finding your bravery and doing what needs to be done...that's kids stuff.