“We are but a moment’s sunlight…”

Journal entry today

I grew up in an era of political violence. I was all of 8-years-old when John Kennedy was assassinated that Friday in Dallas. The entire country was in shock, and I remember well the days that followed, the additional murder of Lee Harvey Oswald, the adult conversations, the televised funeral. Dark, dark days.

It was quiet for a while, but then came Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy in rapid succession. I was a 7th grader then, but it still made no sense.

In between all of that had been the rise of the hippie culture and the Summer of Love (1967). These things caught my attention and has never let me go. It was in the music and culture. It was part of everything. I still believe in the values I grabbed onto at age 12, and I don't see any reason to give them up. They define me now, even at age 68.

Now there has been an act of political violence once again. The target is someone I disagree with on every level. But to me violence is violence and is not warranted. It solves nothing.

I still believe love does solve everything. This is not airy-fairy because love is HARD.

Today I was reminded of a song that was out during the summer of 1969 -- "Get Together' by The Youngbloods. It begins:

Love is but a song we sing 

Fear the way we die

You can make the mountains sing

Or make the angels cry...

[Listen to full song here.The boy on the bicycle in the video reminds me so much of my little brother it was freaky!]

After the era of violence and unrest in the 1960s, we ended up with a "reset" of sorts. The Youngbloods' song was the anthem for what we needed to do. That summer we had the long-awaited moon landing and three days of peace and love at Woodstock. I was entering high school.

Everything felt possible.

This country needs a reset. The sooner the better. We have never been so far off. We are running on fear and threats of violence and whats-in-it-for-me.

Worst of all, some people are united by hate. How is that a way to live? How does that contribute anything positive to the American Experiment?

In the second verse of the song, we hear:

Some may come and some may go

We will surely pass

When the one* that left us here

Comes for us at last 

We are but a moment's sunlight

Fading in the grass

Life is fleeting. I'm feeling that more than ever these days. When will we get it together? Time is so short.

 

It is worth our time and effort to make a change.

 

The final verse says:

 

Listen

You hold the key to love and fear

All in your trembling hand

Just one key unlocks them both

It's there at your command

I believe love is possible.

I believe peace is possible.

I believe living the values of America is possible. 

I believe the power is within us

At our command.

And I will never stop believing.

 *The writer of the song, Chester Powell, had written the word WIND, not ONE. It was a Buddhist concept of the opposing states we live in: pleasure/pain, loss/gain, praise/blame, disrepute/fame. However, Jesse Colin Young, the leader of the Youngbloods, was Christian so he changed the lyric. You see opposing concepts in love/fear in the song.

Titanic Lives On

We have come to the conclusion of another great Titanic project. The last couple of days we have spent doing a “read around” where students read each other’s passenger journals and give positive feedback. More than ever before, I was completely “wowed” by the effort so many students took to make their passenger come alive in our minds. Their imagination and creativity, supported by research, is what education is all about. I am forever grateful to Patricia Wachholz for introducing me to this project. This will probably be the best version of it I have seen, and I am grateful. 

Here are a selection of covers. No two journals were alike, and I feel deeply this type of assignment should not be the exception, but the rule. 

(Side note: our 7th grade science teacher has the kids creating habitat dioramas. I heard her commenting to our AP about how great it is going. I feel it is such a shame we feel forced to wait until the end of the year to do the best stuff!)

My #1 Place

Today I visited a place I simply don’t go to enough: the meditation garden at FloridaSouthwestern College.

The weather was absolutely ideal for this adventure, and I was immediately moved to take a ton of pictures. I was particularly happy when the bench where I decided to sit had beautiful orchids nearby.

I had brought a small journal and had a plan for some nature writing, but something else totally overcame me. Here is what I wrote while I was there:

God I love this place.

When I’m here, I feel like I accomplished so much here on these grounds. Creative writing. Humanities. American Literature. Even science and math. The professors are unforgettable. The support I received: unparalleled. 

I was here the morning of 9/11/2001. I worked for Sony and they paid my tuition and books. I paved my way to further my education at Florida Gulf Coast University.

On these grounds is a performing arts center where I’ve seen numerous acts (Bob Dylan, Smokey Robinson, Gladys Knight, Vince Gill,  Jason Mraz, Tanya Tucker, and many more), as well as some great musicals — and not to mention the stage is where I received my first college diploma.

I met a good friend here when we were taking a professional certification test here. In fact, I took all my tests here when they were done with pencil and paper, only cost $25, and you had to wait several weeks for results.

The art gallery has had shows that blew me away, especially Jack Kerouc’s original typed version of On the Road.

I used to attend afternoon events with poets, journalists, and professors here with my friend Amy, who teaches for this college. It was the best use of my PTO from work!

This garden was not here when I attended, and it was called Edison Community College at that time. A statue of Thomas Edison is here, and most of the plants came from his estate.

Today I took a mad amount of pictures and when I sat on the bench I felt an unbelievable calm come over me — like I don’t get anywhere else. I think it is because nature, history, music, art, poetry, and education come together here for me like nowhere else on earth.

I couldn’t have landed in a better place during midlife in the year 2000. All my decisions and growth from that time on are rooted here. Some grew elsewhere, but this was the catalyst. For nearly 24 years. That is a whole hunk of my life!

Today it became clear: When I need to find myself, I must remember to look here. 

The Women

I've been hearing of novelist Kristin Hannah for years, but it wasn't until this book I decided to make her a priority. My friend Laurie sent it to me after a short text discussion about being on long list at the local library to get the book in hand. It is already number one on the New York Times Bestseller list, and I am so glad I got to read it so shortly after its release.

The story follows a young woman in mid-1960s California who voluntary signs up to be an Army nurse and is sent to Vietnam. It is trial by fire for this woman, as she is there during the escalation of the war, and the events such as the Tet Offensive. Much of the book takes place after her return from Vietnam, and what she encounters, and how life takes many drastic turns.

I appreciated that Hannah's research into this time gives it the accurate feeling I remember about that time. I lived in a world where the war was regularly shown on television, and as a middle-schooler during the time of the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, I was well-aware of the feelings about the war. The generation gap was a real thing, but as an admirer of Kennedy, I believed in his stance against the war. Years later I would learn MLK was speaking out against it as well, which was creating new enemies for him.

 

My dad's cousins were drafted, and came back changed men. PTSD is real, and they had many struggle which affected them the rest of their lives.

The war loomed in my high school years as well, as the draft threatened my brother and the young men I knew. All though out The Women, Hannah gets these details right. The way she describes the general feelings of the nation, especially young people, rings true to me. This goes right up to the Peace Accord of 1973 -- the year I graduated from high school. I remember we all knew that the agreement had been made and there was quite a party on New Years Eve 1972 when we felt free of the yoke of Vietnam.

 

The sad part is that the Vietnamese kept fighting, and the war didn't officially end for them until The Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. Sadly, that was right after my little brother died, and I wasn't even aware of what happened on that day until three years later in a movie theater when I was watching a film called Coming Home, the first of many films about the war and the aftermath.

 

*

The Women ends in 1982 when the memorial in Washington D.C. was dedicated for the 58,220 American lives lost, called The Wall.

 

I first visited The Wall in Washington D.C. by myself in September 1990 when I was in town for a conference. But it would be 1993 when it would take on even greater meaning for me.

In 1992 I met my friend Iris, and in January of 1993 her son took his life. We became fast friends after that. Iris is seven years older than I am, and had served in the Air Force during the time of the Vietnam War, although she never went there. She is a veteran of those times, so when we visited Washington D.C. in November 1993 for a conference, the monuments took on a more significant meaning than just my coming-of-age memories.

 

We drove to D.C. on November 11, 1993 (Veterans Day), and that day was significant because the Women's Memorial had been dedicated that day, giving recognition to the ones that were so often forgotten. (A common refrain in the novel is the many times the main character heard There were no women in Vietnam. In fact, there were over 10,000, eight who lost their lives.)

We had not been able to get tickets for the opening event at the conference, so that gave us the morning to visit the monuments. Given that it was Veterans Day Weekend, the mall were very busy, and we felt like something so large and significant. The amount of decorations was mind-boggling.

It was the Women's Memorial that took our breath away. The emotion on the faces is something to behold. I remember how much we wanted to just stay there and talk to people, and just BE. It was a gorgeous morning, and the timing was perfect.

 

 

On the back of the photograph below I had written that the man's name is Leroy and he was part of the Walk of the Warriors. He was having vets sign his flag, and Iris was happy to do so. (As an aside, this is the gift of good old photographs...I would not even remember what this was about if it wasn't written on the back of the photo.)

I looked up Walk of the Warriors and learned it was ignited by the Navajo Veterans Administration to honor their vets, in particular their women, and was timed for the dedication of the monument. Read more here.

I highly recommend everyone read The Women to understand more deeply what happened during that time, and why I continue to pray for peace as the real resolution to the problems of the world. And if nothing else, while reading it you will certainly be entertained by the celebrated storyteller that is Kristin Hannah.