I watched the kids making paper doves, a peace symbol, and preparing to send them to Iraqi children. When I was in fifth grade, nothing mattered outside Oxnard, where I lived, and no one other than Mickey Mantle could get my attention. How times have changed. This time, South Bay Elementary School teacher Linda Sorter was teaching her class about the power of love. She’s summoned me to take TV pictures of it.

Sorter was teaching outside her box, and that didn’t set well with her superiors. Paper doves weren’t going to help math and English scores. She probably had some choice words about education in a vacuum. It was a tough time to teach otherwise. We were ramping up to our “shock and awe” Baghdad invasion, a polarizing time. For Linda to suggest her kids wear black to oppose war was risky business. Sadly, Linda’s peace campaign was not a “good” TV story either. News directors would have called it a “vo-sot,” TV lingo for pictures and a 15-second sound bite. They use them to boost the story count. Trumped by the high-speed police chase, the bank robbery and the mayor’s ribbon cutting, it might have preceded the local weather: “Speaking of peace doves, local weather birds can expect a foul weekend.”

I remember feeling badly that I didn’t have more time for Linda, especially when the school system opted to transfer her away from her kids. Her decision to fight it, however important the principle, didn’t make for good TV either. Furthermore, I could see the other side of the story. Parents wanted their kids to be students, not activists. In the same situation, I would have caved in, but then, I was told only the bad guys in Baghdad would get hurt, and the fighting would be over in 90 days (certainly by baseball’s All-Star break). I’m older and wiser now. Being out of the TV news business will do that for you.

Sorter had done what she did because she feared no one else would. She had seen her job as becoming lifeless, ceasing to inspire her as it had for so many years. In retrospect, I know how she felt. We all need to feel that each new day brings promise, even if you’re the only one who understands the promise.

For me, it’s dancing with a Dominican rooster on my head. For Linda, it was teaching kids that a paper dove could make a difference. Both, I submit, come from the same chamber of the heart. I thought of Linda again when I read her recent letter to the editor.

In Sunny Brae, where she and Jim Sorter live, someone had struck and killed their cat. It was the feline they had rescued in Mexico where they’d been helping save endangered sea turtles. She was sad and angry that no one took responsibility, either for the turtles or the cat, but miracles abide in animals, dead or alive, and the Sorters’ cat had shown me what remarkable people they are, the story I couldn’t tell on the evening news.

Rather than retire to an RV park, they were pursuing their vision to save the world, whether by paper dove or turtle’s egg. I saw them at Arcata’s Endeavor, the center where disconnected people find food and help. The Sorters work there six hours a day now, keeping track of the hundreds who seek help. Many, says Jim, a combat veteran, are veterans too. Both hope the non-profit service center finds a new home.

The Sorters came to know Sandi Cortez, whose battles with drug addiction had taken a troubled path. Sandi, now in her fifties, had never given up on a college education. The Endeavor had given her the resources and courage to give it another shot. Sandi is finishing her studies at College of the Redwoods, where she is earning her Associate’s Degree. She’ll then be enrolling at Humboldt State University, realizing her vision of one day wearing a cap and gown. The other day, I introduced Sandi to an unlikely ally, a young woman who already has more material wealth than Sandi could possibly imagine. HSU student Alex Hurley wants to save the Endeavor, adopting the cause as her public relations project for class credit. The cynic in me had seen it before, a class project and nothing more, but I’ve underestimated her as much as the world has typecast Sandi. I could see that the moment they met. In fact, it’s amazing what you see when you give yourself the time.

Tomorrow’s headline may tell me that gasoline prices have risen and home sales have fallen. If that doesn’t get me, I can kvetch about my cable TV choices or lament the meltdown of Barry Zito. Better still, I could call my cranky brother. Or, I could step outside and watch for people who don’t talk in sound bites, and understand life’s beauty. They are Alex and Sandi, the college kindred spirits, or Jim and Linda, who have shown us the courage to believe. They’ve found in themselves — and in each other — a powerful light. Add it to the sum of light — but it also burns brightly on its own.

Dave Silverbrand is a local TV personality and teaches journalism at College of the Redwoods.