By Debbie Lynn
I was off the grid for a while.
When we returned, I was more than appalled by the current affairs and the horrid happenings (not to mention my disdain to the non-stop rhetoric of POTUS responding to the atrocity).
As I scrolled though my news feed I read a myriad soap-boxed posts professing their “whiteness” and love for all colors, races and creeds, etc. With my heart and mind aflame I started to join the call, but as I did, something changed inside me. I thought I was armed and ready to shame the shamers for shaming, yet I stopped.
I realized sounding off on social media (gathering likes to stroke my ego) is such a waste. What would a few harsh words do anyway? And my “friends”? I already know they are with me (we share common values) so it is obvious that my redundancy would be nothing more than redundant. After all, there were plenty of voices and respected writers saying the same thing, “We are disgusted, we are saddened, and we are over it”
With that, all the words drained from my head and for once…I backed off. This is not my normal M.O. and I began to question my motive. I wondered where I was headed and who really gave a shit. I looked into my ego and saw this arrogant position I where I had planted my feet in and realized it was nothing but mud.
I felt dirty, I felt remorse, I desperately needed a spiritual bath.
But the biggest revelation hit my heart hard and turned me inside out. I just didn’t have the will or the fervor to make “the right” noise. This change in persona has been a long time in the making. Call it old age, or ageless wisdom but to add more agitation to the already chaotic and ugly situation seems futile.
My stand is common—a thread we all share—so I sit here and ponder how to help.
Duh, we all know right from wrong. We all know hatred is born and bred in ignorance. Honestly, right now, I don’t have a better answer but in the progressive world we live in, I feel it must be different, yet it isn’t.
My granddaughter is of color and she is well aware of this fact but she is NOT aware of how much hatred there is against it. She just doesn’t acknowledge it, and blissfully blind, she is a child, but (most importantly) she is being raised to love and respect everyone. And I never thought her skin would be an issue, but lately I feel the need to protect her. I would be lying if I told you I don’t have some fear for her safety, so my only consolation is that with my heart of hearts, I understand it is only a small portion of the population.
For a long time I have been under the influence of a gentler vision for our world and a non-violent approach to our current state of affairs, so a rant to fight what is not fightable is a steep contradiction.
I realize my words would be (in fact) violent. So (for me) ranting—no matter how well conceived—is a form of violence. The end.
Many will dispute that we must raise our voices to be heard, and my stand has been, and will continue to be, raise your vibration instead (it’s contagious). The bar has been set high on this one and it is about raising consciousness, not a hand or angry words. I am proud of my decision not to write out the nastiness, but I struggle (I do). I want desperately to find a way to soften the hard edges, yet I know we need them and I wrote:
We all know the atrocity in the aftermath of racism—but I have to believe that our time is not their time…. How about a different agenda?
Light up!
Twisted woven nightmares—the unthinkable just keeps seeping into our space.
But we have the power to stand, to untie and to wake-the-fuck UP. And talk? It is cheap—it isn’t until the moon passes the sun, mercury does its thing and we are shaken to our weary bones that change is going to happen. It won’t be pretty. Are you ready? Darkness cannot illuminate a sunless planet… it is timely, but far from hopeless. We need sharp edges to cut away the poison crap and then we all soften.
The Yin to the Yang to the bone, say a little prayer…it is time, more than time.
And the song that is more than an earworm looping over and over again:
“You may I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. I hope someday you will join me, and the world will live as one.” – John Lennon
Photo: Pixabay
Editor: Dana Gornall
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