"Little Men" by Louisa May Alcott Done

I just finished this sequel to Little Women in which Jo is all grown up, married and running a school for boys. It reminded me of Benion’s ranch because when I went there, we had boys from all walks of life, much like in the book. She has some rich kids who go to the school like a boarding school, orphans with no other place to go, and a few boys in between. Benion didn’t have orphans, but some of the kids there were pretty close to parentless. Also like Benion’s, manual labor was a part of the boys’ days which is so healthy for adolescents. Making boys full of hormones sit quietly in school desks is inhumane, and they know that at Jo’s school.

Other wisdom of the book is how incredibly careful Jo and her husband are to treat each boy as an individual. For each child, there are different expectations for their behavior and learning, tailored to that child. Though that isn’t remotely fair, it is loving and just, which is far more important and more difficult than being fair.

Finally, they do an amazing job of calling out the individual strength of each boy, and it is inspiring to watch the ways the boys rise to that call. We don’t do enough of that in our society because we are afraid of men being strong. Strong men are dangerous, of course, but that’s fine with me as long as they are good.

In a book called Wild at Heart, John Eldridge talks about men who are dangerous but good. One such character who totally embodies this is Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird. Just how dangerous is this unassuming southern lawyer? See what he can do to a mad dog with a rifle, or to a racist jury with his discourse. Watch out.