Friday, June 12, 2020

4601 A Too Long Letter to My Children




You’re all grownups now.  Way beyond the age where advice from an aged parent has to mean much.  Humor me.

Your mother and I are veterans of times like these, times that most of you had never seen.  Times when there were protests and riots and looting and fires and death.  In hindsight, they don’t seem as bad now as they did at the time or as bad as things have become now.  But they were.

Technology that blossomed in your lifetime has changed some things and not changed others. In the 1950s and 60s when civil rights and anti-war movements grew like mushrooms, there were no cell phones or social media or Zoom.  There was no “Antifa,” which I believe is more a set of ideas than an organized social movement.  And the extreme right wingers of that day were tame by today’s standards.  No American, black, white, Asian, Native American; Arab or Jew, Christian or Muslim would have tolerated today’s version of life.

No Donald trump or Mitch McConnell would have had the temerity to run for office, let alone win it and use it to club the rest of us into submission.  But then and now, the horror makers are fruit from the same tree.

And, of course, there was no pandemic which has complicated everything else we think and do today.  

When mom and I were young, your grandparents were just coming out from under what’s now known as “The Great Depression” and heading into World War II.

Your mom and I married young and stayed married for more than 40 years.  We have each gone our own ways since.  But we still have a commonality of views on many things and a history.  And we each are tied to the four of you and your offspring.  I can’t speak for her. But I’d bet my social security check and that cute little bonus trump sent to many of us that she worries about you with the same regularity and intensity that I do.

She handles worry better than I. And less publicly. But it’s there. It has to be.

A lot of life is like Alka Seltzer. You drop the tablet into a cup of water and whatever the benefits, they’re most effective before the water stops fizzing.  Ultimately, left alone, it dilutes.  So do lots of things including the crap we’re all experiencing today.

It’s all going to dilute. And/or we’re all going to get used to some of it.  And I hope whatever good comes of it, rubs off on you before it stops fizzing.

Note to readers who are not my kids:

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Any Questions? wesrichards@gmail.com
© WJR 2020.

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4759 The Supreme Court

  C’mon, guys, we all know what you’re doing.  You’re hiding behind nonsense so a black woman is not the next Associate Justice of the  U.S....