Categories
Political

The non-conformist

Full title of photograph:

The Non-conformist among the patriots at a strip mall in St. Louis

defiance.jpg

Categories
Political

Far away thoughts

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

I woke the morning of the last day of March with other things on my mind, of shoes and ships and sealing wax and cabbages and kings but then I did some weblog reading and that changed the course of the day. Where before my mind was on visiting the Arboretum and taking some Spring photos for posting, teaching English in South Korea, and a trip next week to San Francisco, now it’s on war and peace.

When I read Loren’s comments tonight, I was given pause:

Before I went to work this morning I read Jonathon’s comments on “always writing about war,” no matter what we are writing about. For a short while, I thought that I had been re-inspired to comment on the war.

After coming home after working on taxes most of the day and going through physical therapy for my herniated disc, I came home and read the comments on Jonathon’s blog entry. Then I turned to Shelley’s multi-entry, plus comments, on the same topic.

Somehow after reading all the divisive ideas i felt too tired, much too tired, to even bother commenting on the idea.

About the last thing I wanted to do was add to the divisive voice, but I know that I have. What can I say? It’s a talent I have. I think I’m destined to always be that rock in the stream – the one every raft hits. El Diablo Aqua.

There is only one road to war, but a thousand roads to peace. Unfortunately, many of us who likely agree with each other are all choosing to walk down different roads, and the only way we can hear each other, or think we can hear each other, is to shout.

I have so much self-investment in the fight against the war in Iraq that I tend to see the peace movement as my own personal statement. However, that’s as foolish as me thinking I personally failed because the war started. Time to de-personalize this war, because we’ll need to save all of our energy working for a solution to the mess we’re in. As has been pointed out
today we have a great deal of thinking and work to do.

But first things first, we need to build a bridge between us, and the way to do that is to find common points of agreement. So, I’ll throw out a simple idea, just to start, and we’ll see how we do with it.

I believe there is hope. I truly believe there is hope.

And though this is dated April first, this is no fool’s joke.