Showing posts with label hope. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hope. Show all posts

Saturday, November 08, 2008

One of These Things is Not Like the Others



It was different this time, wasn't it? The day after the election, the day after the U.S. elected our first African-American President. That day was different than any other day after the election had ever been. Did you notice? Did you look at black people differently that day? Did they seem different to you?

I didn't vote for Obama, so I can't take credit for this historic event. I voted for McCain, for experience, for certainty, for a party whose promise of limited government involvement, trickle-down economics and pro-life leanings appeal to me. But imagine if McCain had won.

That day after the election would have felt no different than the day before. Little would have changed. And my vote would have been a vote for the status quo -- for better or worse.

And it wouldn't have been any different.

But it is different now. A pivotal moment in the trajectory of this country has occurred. A man of color has been elected to the highest office in the greatest nation on Earth.

I admit to being a cynic, to not believing his message of hope. Now that Obama is President, I will pray for him, for his guidance, for his wisdom, for his protection. I will pray that his promises were not empty, that he will be able to bring about the positive change he pledged. I pray that he will prove me wrong. And that our nation will be different -- and better.

Sunday, April 06, 2008

A Permanent State

Coldplay singing from my iTunes, echoes my thoughts from long, long ago:

When I was a young boy I tried to listen
And I wanna feel like that,
Little white shadows blink and miss them
Part of a system, I am

If you ever feel like something's missing
Things you'll never understand,
Little white shadows sparkle and glisten,
Part of a system, a plan

All this noise I'm waking up
All this space I'm taking up
All this sound is breaking up

Maybe you'll get what you wanted
Maybe you'll stumble upon it
Everything you ever wanted
In a permanent state


Words I wrote perhaps 25 years ago:

To live on a mesa I really don't know.

Downhill so sudden
Verbatim vast
Crepuscular plummet
So hard to forecast


Not much has changed.

God, are you listening?

Are you there?

If you are, help me understand: Why do you not answer our prayers?