I haven't written anything online in a while. It feels like a cesspool that doesn't need another movement. I realize though if I don't write here, then I won't write anything other than song lyrics, text messages and emails where I ask how many devices need to connect to the wireless in the production office.
After the election in November I wanted to think before I opened my mouth and wrote something down. I tried to not add another opinion to the pile, or another movement to the pool, but I found myself responding and at times running with it. That's not what I wanted to do, because that's what often end up doing. This year has shown me that things are going to change, and they are going to change fast and unpredictably. My failed attempt at a self imposed silence was an effort to anticipate that change and form a better response than firing out of anger from the hip.
The silence I have been able to establish in my internal dialogue is fragile. All to easily it becomes denial, and denial in these times is holds a special appeal. I want to find a peace of mind that isn't constructed on a willful omission. So I catch myself and reinforce the silence, but the silence is letting me down, so here I am on a Saturday night, trying to think through my fingers.
I've held so many wrong thoughts lately about my country and my planet. Fantastic notions that I fall in love with for a heartbeat that slip away just as fast as they appear. It takes a whole lot of thinking to get through any given day.
I believe in our republic, imperfect as it may be. I remember a lifetime ago wanting to see it burn. I live dis-functionally with the ghost of Brandon passed, and I am grateful for all of the years under the bridge. I am not wise, but I now can occasionally appreciate wisdom when I encounter it. Memory is such a powerful force, I recall the feeling of being right when I wasn't. It's those memories that drive me to shut up and think before I speak, and that fill me with regret when I can't help myself.
And here we are in the common era. By force we will have to consider many things we took as granted. I think that I grew up with an illusion of human society, that it was knowable. I think I was educated to believe so. I couldn't imagine my third grade teacher standing in front of the classroom and telling us that we have only the smallest bit of understanding in nearly all subjects, and that it was far more likely that anything she could teach us would eventually be proved to be more wrong than right. Would that have been a strange or scary lesson to learn? And how does one teach the elusive nature the unknown?
So I do love our republic, and I'd like to keep it, but what I've really come to understand is that my true love is humanity, unbound by border or ideology. Of the options available to me I still believe that this republic is the best place to practice my humanity. I think the only thing I can stand in front of a classroom full of third graders and say is that you should practice your humanity as often as possible and with the broadest variety you can handle.