Each of our lives tells a story.
Creation is told in the form of a story. Creation of the earth, creation of woman and man.
The cities we live in tell stories. Stories of place.
The territories we traverse, the small towns we will not stop in.
Countries tell stories. Truths that name reality. Lies spewed out by insufficient leadership. Each narrative impacts the social well-being of a country; it’s economy, it’s healthcare system.
We are all a web of stories weaved. Spun for the good, the bad, or the ugly, our actions have consequences and the words we place around them matter. They create a narrative and impact others. Our stories—of creation, of a nation, of a person’s life, have great impact on those around us, and those who are to come.
I am a story-teller by nature. I love the personality of cities, how “place” shows up as a main character in any narrative that is told. I love the literary device which allows us to tell our stories from a specific Point of View. There is much power in the words we speak about ourselves, our families, our places of origin. There is much power in the words that are spoken over us.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg left us this past month in a state of shock and disbelief, as we were already fatigued from fighting the haze of smoke, fire, racism, hatred, divisiveness, and fear which have become synonymous with 2020. Associate Justice of the Supreme Court for 30 years, advocate of women’s’ and minorities’ rights, survivor of colon, lung, and pancreatic cancer (although eventually Ginsburg would succumb to complications from the latter), I imagine a word that comes up in those who re-tell Ruth’s story is ‘tenacious.’
We might consider utilizing a bit of tenacity as we recall the story our nation’s state of affairs at present. It takes grit to overcome cancer multiple times, to hold a position of power with grace and fight for injustice in the face of heinous bias. We might consider channeling the spirit of Ginsburg in this year which seemingly refuses to let up.
The “leader” holding this nation’s highest office proves to be incapable of the job. He has revealed himself to be concerned neither with the youngest (sending America’s children back to school by pressuring the CDC to reopen amidst election year priorities) nor the most oppressed (injustice for Breonna Taylor, an EMT fatally shot in her own bed) who are citizens of the United States, but instead to be one who delights in divisiveness, spewing hatred towards Asian Americans by continuing to call a virus that has killed more than 1 million (as of September 29, 2020) by the racially charged term “Kung Flu.” In the face of such madness, we must ask ourselves: “What would we like the story of our nation to be? How do we want to tell it? Better yet, how can we live it so that the generations which follow us have examples of how to be better, kinder, more just human beings?”
Ruth Bader Ginsburg is quoted as saying, “You can have it all. You just can’t have it all at once.”
One can have extreme power and privilege over others, but not without those “others” being oppressed. One can get ahead while others are systematically forced behind, but not without standing on the necks of “some.” On the flip, one can create a legacy of kindness and goodness, but not by spewing divisiveness and hate. One can grow and stretch and move past a slight (or in America’s case, systemic injustice) but not without confronting the reality of what has been. Not without shedding light on the reality of the story.
In my own life, I have found this to be true. One thing is sacrificed for the goal of achieving another. To achieve a lifelong dream of moving to a new city, one must save money, pack bags, and leave behind the familiar for the risk of the unknown. To obtain a degree, one must apply, pay a fee, and do the work once you get there, to eventually call oneself a “Master." To enter into a type of relationship unlike any other they have had, one must learn new ways of relating, of being, of showing up as their authentic self. Our choices guide us down paths which become chapters of our life stories, for the good or for the bad.
It’s time for each of us --- America, individually and collectively---to ask "What is really important? What are our priorities? What kind of world do we want to leave to our children? What do we want our legacy to be?”
It’s time to take a good, hard look at our personal lives, our actions, our responsibility to and for one another, and our leadership and ask: "Do we like the story we are telling? Do we agree with the larger narrative that has been weaved by a privileged few? Are we listening to the voices of the many? Are we courageous enough to take personal responsibility? Is it time to take out the pen, find the courage enough to sit down at the desk, and do our part to engage the work, to write a new chapter in a story which has been told one way for far too long?
Is it time?
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