THIS COULD BE A WIKILEAKS

Recently, I attended Boxer Day, which is the day after Christmas, at my former neighbor's pad. It is mainly a day to get together and eat and drink. A good time. My wife and I have this little game we play: who can find the most interesting person at the gathering. I won hands down. Ian, a recently naturalized American from Scotland. He was so proud of being an American and could not be restrained from telling about the process: the paperwork, the interviews, the tests, the people he had met along the way. If only Americans felt the same way about their country. Anyway, got me to thinking and I dug out this email I had saved from a friend. As we begin a new year, being appreciative of all we have and living in such a great country is no small thing and a good place to begin a year.


A friend commented on comparing America to the UK. It is too good not to preserve. He was discussing what it meant to be back in England, after living in the States for years. England is still a strange mix. The people here are still grindingly nasty, rude, ignorant, angry and miserable. The majority of them really are detestable. On the other hand we have little contact with the outside world and at this time of the year (and at almost all others) we live in a beautiful city. The fact that we have the National Health Service gives me a strong sense of security about life. It's the one important thing I think the US lacks. Of course it is screwed up here in so many ways...but that's another story. Funny though the psychological difference it makes to a person who has been living in the USA since 1985.

MY COMMENTS:I'm smiling about your comments about your fellow countrymen. It sounds like you are homesick for America which isn't a bad thing. You would have to be after being here so long. With all our faults, relatively speaking, one can be what they want to be or say what they want in America and sometimes I even wish it was a little less. I am appalled at these idiot shouters like Beck and Limbaugh and the nasty stuff they say about the president or others they don't like. I want to kick their asses but it is America. I think the "GFs (Girlfriends) are somewhat of a microcosm of America. You have one who is to the right of Ghengis Khan and then another who is way left of most anybody. They argue, curse and fifteen seconds later they are talking about something else and the rest of us happily join right in.

From my standpoint it is a matter of perspective. I think in general the world is in a pretty big mess and we're working our way out of it crisis by crisis. Most of it is like the American fairy tail, Brer Rabbit, facing the Tar Baby. You hit one place and stick but before you know it, there's another and you are stuck on the last crisis. And, to be perfectly honest, I worry, which is my tendency, about the future of our grandchildren when you have idiot nations with nukes; and, our own nation making stupid decisions like Iraq and Afghanistan.


One thing that really bothers me is that the pressures of life make it harder to be compassionate and generous. That sounds like an excuse but it has felt that way for the last couple of years. But with everything that's happening to undermine our sense of security (which is I think what human beings really crave) and then all the wonderful personal news I have had recently it makes me turn ever more inwards to enjoy cherished and to protect the things that are mine. I must remember to look outwards and at lease give money to charities as a substitute for giving my time. I really felt I was doing something useful when I volunteered. You know that the US people are by FAR the most generous when it comes to giving. It's harder in the UK because there simply is not the culture. I think it says a lot about the U.S. and its citizens.

Anyway, my feeling is that all I can do is provide financial insulation from the vaguries of life, and hand in hand with that give a strong and joyous character so tat she is kind, compassionate, generous, happy and strong... Now how do I do that????? I was talking to my Mountaineer brother about this yesterday - can you develop a good character without suffering?... Discuss!

Develoing a good character without suffering? I think so but suffering is often not chosen but when, through no fault of our own, it happens, at some point down the road, we can reflect and say, "it has made me better." We had this same discussion with the "Girlfriends" recently. It centered around the fact that so many soldiers coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan are claiming PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). Andy, ever the skeptic relayed his own experience as a 12 year old when the Nazis occupied his Greek Village. He watched the Nazis gun down all the men from his village. And, yet, even though the trauma of it has haunted his entire life, he has moved on and been extremely successful. His story is recounted in this really good memoir, Just Another Man. HIs question and one that will be asked often in the future. How does tragedy incapacitate some and mobilize others.