I'm pretty emotional today but the best kind of emotional - like overwhelmed with what a great people we are, and how blessed we are to live in this country! I turn nostalgic as I watch the cameras pan over all the facial reactions throughout the crowd after Clemson's kicker missed that goal. It caused to me to think back on that old intro we used to watch
on Wild World of Sports in the 80's. You remember it, "The thrill of victory, and the agony of defeat.” I was suddenly almost choked up by how together in it all we used to feel here in America. And then I found a sorrow I often find in my spirit that aches over the sad reality that so many people don't hardly understand a word I just wrote. It's foreign to their ears and hearts.
It's a rainy day in Manhattan and I'm napping, watching football, and listening to relaxing rain outside my hotel window. I step into the on site restaurant filled with big screens, and a live DJ playing Top 40 hits over the commercial breaks. The place is packed. I join a group at the bar and order a burger as we've now moved to the Alabama game. We all immediately act like family, nudging each other and shouting together, laughing, telling stories in between plays. It's alive in here and people are so genuinely glad to be connected in a room like this again. We'd taken all of this for granted for so long.
I spent some time in Hot Springs, Arkansas to get a last minute passport a few days ago. I studied the historical pictures and marveled at the engineering savvy that found innovative ways to pump that healing hot mineral water into bath houses, spas, and hotels. Pictures of a politician standing to preserve our national parks such as this one. People wanted to see people healed. Ok let's face it, some just wanted their prostitutes healed of syphilis but that's a whole other story. In reality, people truly wanted to protect this incredible healing resource for any number of illnesses. One native bath house attendee put it this way, she said, "They didn't have vaccines and such back then. They just came here to get healed."
We've been a country that really cared, and had the wherewithal to stand for, and by our fellow citizen in these ways. The 1940s were war torn times, and that is part of the reason, I believe, that people were humbled, and more overtly caring, and compassionate. I don't know about you, but I don't want it to take that again for us to get back to this spirit in America. I don't want to be brought to our knees to become more charitable with our brothers and sisters. I want us to make the choice to surrender our self-serving ways in this country - to turn ourselves in, so to speak, and sit shackled for a bit until we can find our real selves again. Maybe that is what Covid was all about - a sort of house arrest for the heart. I know it's never been perfect here in the good ol' U.S. of A. but it's been a "far cry" from where we are today.
Here's what I'm proposing: let's take a week to reflect on the greatness of we the people, and this wonder-filled county we live in, then write about it, or memorize our thoughts about it, post on social media about it, go to coffee with friends and talk about it. Then, do it again the next week, and the next, and so on. 2024 could go either way for us all - more division - much more division, or more love - much more love. We choose.
Love to all,
Jill