One Day in August: Hoping for change

In a room on one side of the world a mother plays on the piano, whilst her baby daughter sits smiling and shaking a rattle. She listens to the rain beating down on the metal roof of her warm home and thinks of the synchronicity of the piece she is playing, ‘Kiss the Rain’, with the weather outside.

Far away, on the other side of the world, a mother packs her bag for a brave journey to a place where children have no home. She is taking her laptop and camera with her. She is leaving her child in good hands. She hasn’t flown anywhere before and she is not going for a holiday, but to tell a message. She has a gift with words and there are thousands of women with stories to tell. Mothers to children that don’t have the basic health care to keep them alive. Mothers that have said sad farewells to their children needlessly.

In a tent, somewhere in the middle, a mother holds her crying child in her arms and wonders where the next meal will come from. She wishes for clean water for her child to drink and bathe in.

And so it is, these women miles apart are joined by their love for their children, but one woman is powerless – as are millions of others. It is up to those who can, to press for change.

And so the mother on the piano presses down the keys to sing out a melody, hoping for change. She presses a button and signs her name to a petition for change. She sponsors a child in a country far away and sends letters of hope. She contributes to emergency aid requests with small donations. She hopes that world leaders will pull together and listen to the pleas for help. She feels a united pull around the globe of mothers everywhere uniting and giving a voice to those who need to be heard.

And on one day in August, a mother takes a photograph – inspired by ‘Sticky Fingers: The Gallery‘.

It is the same day that three UK parenting bloggers, Josie, Sian and Eva, fly to Bangladesh for a week to help raise awareness of the work Save the Children is doing with mothers and children in one of the most poverty-stricken places on the planet.

My photograph is one of hope on a backdrop of rain. Hope that the basics of clean water, food, shelter, medical aid and a better quality of life one day become a reality for all. That the earth becomes their playground and not their foe. That their voices are heard and truly listened to.

Sarah x

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