2006. It's been a scary year in a scary world. We go to bed each night with the evening news and its daily serving of carnage churning our insides so that it's difficult to sleep. Maybe it's always been that way, but it sure seems writ even larger this year.
In this post-9/11 world, I have nightmares of buildings collapsing, blazing missiles in the sky, and things blowing up. And where I live is pretty safe. I can't imagine what kind of dreams people have who really live near the hot spots of our world with suicide bombings and terrorist acts daily.
There are days when the problems of the world are not front-and-center in my mind. In the morning, I whisper a quick prayer for our military personnel overseas and that's that. The rest of the day, I'm totally absorbed in my own concerns. Maybe too self-absorbed. "Someone's son was killed? Oh. I've got to get this letter out by five." How callous the constant availability of 24-hour news makes us all.
I grew up in the '50s when we were taught to hide under our desks for fear of a nuclear bomb. Throughout the '60s and '70s, I feared a nuclear holocaust. For a while, I was convinced that it was inevitable. I used to wonder what it was going to be like when "It" had finally happened. But I was young, and it's hard to live in constant fear. There were enough distractions.
Now I don't worry about all-out nuclear war, just dirty bombs that might take out a city or two. Or anthrax. Or some things I really don't want to mention here.
Yet I will once again, along with my countrymen, embark upon another holiday season. I will make my offerings for the Thanksgiving table and travel to my sister's house. We will eat, drink, and be very merry. We are all doing well, my family and I. We all have good homes and more than enough to eat and our closets are full. We will have a good time. But when we go home, we will turn on the radio and hear the bad news.
When I was a little girl I watched the newsreels of goose-stepping Nazis and wondered what it would have been like to actually live through such a terrible era. When Korea was saber-rattling a few weeks ago, I watched the images of their goose-stepping army. I was chilled as I realized anew that I am indeed living through "such a terrible era."
Later, while talking to my son, a college freshman enrolled in ROTC, I shared these fears, including my fear that Korea could launch a nuclear weapon against us.
My son was quiet for a moment and then said, "Mom, if they try something like that, they'll lose."
And that was that. There was no bragging in his tone, just his matter-of-fact assessment of the situation. Mine was the feminine impulse: Weakness. Fear. Despair. His was the response of the masculine: Strength. Fight. Win. God bless testosterone.
My son's simple response that evening – "they'll lose" – gave me hope. There will always be brave and strong Americans who will not give in to evil or defeatist attitudes. For this American spirit, this Thanksgiving, I do indeed give thanks.
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