A Feeling of a Place Where We Ache to Go Again

Today is Thanksgiving.  Wherever, however, and with whomever you spend it, it is my most sincere wish for you and yours that it is a peaceful, safe, and happy Thanksgiving.  

For those of us fortunate to spend today in the company of at least some of those people who we love and who love us, let us be mindful that not everyone shares in our good fortune.  Life is hard for most of us but it can be unfairly so for far too many, and tragically it is far too often.  

If you open your eyes this morning and close them tonight in a place where you are loved and a place where you are wanted, then congratulations.  You are home.  Your vow to yourself, to those you love, and to those who love you is to not take that feeling for granted.  Not today.  Not tomorrow.  Not ever.  Work hard today and every day to honor that feeling and, better still, to earn it. 

Appreciate just how precious it is to feel as if you belong.  It possesses the capacity to fill us up more heartily than one's inhalation of turkey and its accompanying side dishes shall ever do.  Experience teaches us all that that feeling - of love, of belonging, of home - is never guaranteed.  Not today.  Not tomorrow.  Not ever.  

Kindness costs nothing.  It is, however, invaluable.  It might just be the beacon that helps someone find his or her way home who otherwise would not have gotten there.  

Happy Thanksgiving.  

-AK 

A Toast to the Watchmen on the Walls of Freedom

 

Today is the sixtieth anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.  While I do not write too often any more, it was on this very date three years ago on which I wrote what appears here.  

Sunday, November 22, 2020

A Testament to the Endurance of Ideas

Fifty-seven years ago today President John F. Kennedy was assassinated while his motorcade snaked its way through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.  He was scheduled to speak at a luncheon before the Dallas Citizens Council.  The speech, which he never gave, remains as relevant and timely today as it was on the date he intended to deliver it. 

Fifty-seven years ago.

On this very day.

We in this country, in this generation, are - 

by destiny rather than by choice - 

the watchmen on the walls of world freedom.

We ask therefore that 

we may be worthy of our power and responsibility,

that we may exercise our strength with wisdom and restraint,

and that we may achieve in our time and for all time

the ancient vision of "peace on earth, goodwill toward men."

That must always be our goal,

and the righteousness of our cause 

must underlie its strength. 

For as was written long ago:

'except the Lord keep the city, 

the watchmen waketh but in vain'...

This Nation's strength and security 

are not easily or cheaply obtained.

There are many kinds of strength

and no one kind will suffice...

Ignorance and misinformation can handicap the progress

of a city or company, but they can,

if allowed to prevail in foreign policy,

handicap this country's security. 

In a world of complex and continuing problems,

in a world of frustrations and irritations, 

America's leadership must be guided 

by the lights of learning and reason -

or else those who confuse rhetoric with reality

and the plausible with the possible

will gain the popular ascendancy 

with their seemingly swift and simple solutions

to every world problem. 

President John F. Kennedy

Speech (not given) to Dallas Citizens Council

November 22, 1963 

-AK 

If you are so inclined, then consider this to be food for thought.  An appetizer if you will for the Thanksgiving feast that you presumably shall enjoy tomorrow.  If any part of your plan for this long holiday weekend includes travel, then be careful out there.

-AK