Choosing Sides

'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.

Alfred Tennyson
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Which side are we on? Those who consider Osama bin Laden a hero, consider Barack Obama a villain. Which side are we on? Those who consider Al Queda friends, consider the current American government an enemy. Which side are we on?

And why must we take sides at all? I was born into a nation which I came to understand was the vanguard of cultural coexistence, liberty. opportunity and human rights. At least it was in theory. I saw the struggles, and got involved in some of them, to try and establish those ideals as true. But all the time I was growing up, and still today I hear about who is in and who is out, who is right and who is wrong, even who is an American and who isn't.

I have also seen the American ideal plummet into ignorance, divisiveness, sensationalism and street corner nastiness. What brought us so low? We are caught in an evil vise where Americans are bombing Muslims and Muslims are bombing Americans. As long as we keep bombing them they will keep bombing us and as long as they keep bombing us we will keep bombing them. What kind of so-called leadership ever brought us to this desperate madness? In all my reading and viewing I haven't found one serious example of anyone trying to figure out why. .I don't know what the average citizen in an Islamic country thinks, but I know that the average American doesn't.

Islam may be the fastest growing religion in the world, but the Muslim fanatics are not going to make the United States a Muslim country any more than the fanatical Christians are going to make it a Christian country in spite of their claims.

Where are the diplomats, the statesmen and women, those who can discuss without venomous name calling? Why can't responsible, progressive thinkers sit down with theologians of all faiths, find out what are the common denominators of Constitutional law, Parliamentary law, Talmudic law and Sheria law, and from there start to work out compromises that allow for a real coexistence among people, a newer world?

Or should we just continue to attack each other until someone drops THE BIG ONE?

Which side are we on? From my point of view, considering the power, technology and weaponry available, it has never been more important to grasp the need to make the world more livable for every nation and to demonstrate what the American ideal was about from the beginning. Are savagery, brutality and war our ideals, or mutual respect, honest competition and good sportsmanship? It is too late to regress into outgrown positions, but to seek and inch forward into a newer world "Tis not too late."

DB - The Vagabond
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AUTUMN QUESTION

(This is not a contest.)

At what event of the past do you wish you could be present? Why?

Only 5 responses so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

Thank you.
DB
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Springing

You've got to continue to grow, or you're just like last night's corn bread - stale and dry.

Loretta Lynn
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"I gave a party and nobody came."

I do not understand why some people really wish to remain stale and dry. So you're physically, mentally and emotionally challenged are you? So what? What's the big deal? What's wrong with searching for the light switch in the dark? Why wait until dawn when everyone else is already "up and at 'em"?

The number of visits to this journal has decreased to an embarrassing level. I'm told that everyone is off twittering and facebooking. I suppose I should be also. After all one has to keep up with the times. Well, I've always been slow at doing things. I'm the tortoise in that famous race. My lack of alacrity has served me well sometimes. It has kept me off bandwagons that got flat tires. It has prevented me from becoming a card carrying member of the Club of Fools. It has held me back from doing shows that folded after two performances. The only thing it hasn't done for me was to barricade me from love affairs that broke my heart. So what? "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all" as Lord Tennyson wrote.

In spite of my apparent lack of enthusiasm about the latest fad or gadget, I believe in taking chances. Life is risky business. It's an iffy thing if there ever was one. So is love. You can't put it in a bottle and seal it any more than you con the air you breathe.

My life is strewn with stumbling blocks of obligations, left over bricks from someone's backyard barbecue. I find it difficult to take care of everything, walking to the market for food, cleaning my apartment, doing my taxes, paying my bills, all the detritus that piles up when you grow older and slow down. But I live in a world of ideas. I don't want to live in any other world. Even though my mind works faster than my fingers, Vagabond Journeys is my reality, not chat rooms. Does that make me an anachronism? I suppose so. Aren't old folks supposed to be anachronistic, fossils of a forgotten age, museum pieces, items on an antique shop shelf?

Spring is coming, cleaning time. I have a birthday, a re-birthday, coming up. There's Easter, the regeneration of life; Passover, escape from the old into the new; buds pushing their way out of the ends of branches; birds pecking their way out of their shells; somewhere a child will take his first step. Where will it lead him?

I refuse to get stale and dry, but where do I go now? What's my destiny? What's yours? What is the desperate, immortal craving of humanity and how will it be filled? There are no easy answers. I write to ponder these mysteries. But if I am not getting out into the New World maybe it's time to do something else.

Let me not forget to express my appreciation and gratitude to the few of you who still read my entries and comment. To you goes my love.

Dana - The Vagabond
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Spring is coming !
WINTER QUESTION
(This is not a contest.)

Given the resources and opportunity, what one thing do you want to do in 2010 that you've never done before.

You have Winter to answer. Answers will be posted on the first day of Spring.
Only 20 responses so far.

DB - The Vagabond