The list, if you let me start it, will roll out slowly, tentatively at first, as if testing the waters between us. It will watch for your shrug or your sigh, for you to politely cut me off with a statement of dismissal, or forcefully drive your point into its stream before it gathers momentum.
But if you are feeling gracious and let me ramble, it will pick up speed. You may have thought you knew just what I would say, but I would surprise you. It’s all there, just under the surface. The expected and the norm-shattering, together.
Each morning I rise and wonder if this is the day the dam breaks. The sides of the sandcastle begin to shear off and slide into the center pool, dissolving, despite the incessant pack-pack-packing the foundation into compliance, sturdy and steady and sticking.
I long to test it somewhere safe, to see how bad the flood is. I don’t know where that is, but I’m searching.
We are living in very trying times. I’ve been watching bits and pieces of Ken Burn’s Vietnam documentary to remind myself that trying times are part of humanity and history. I have great faith that we will end up a better place, and I am excited about this next generation. Until I watched some of them march with torches down my daughter’s campus. Sigh.
Fresh Air interview was really good – the Kent State part gave me chills, and hits really close to home in our city right now.
http://www.npr.org/2017/09/21/552575164/in-vietnam-war-ken-burns-wrestles-with-the-conflict-s-contradictions
I hear you. And am so grateful for you here.