justplainbil

Just Plain Bill

Democracy is in the Air

There are certain times of the year when one can almost sense a change in the environment, when things tend to feel “different.”

I live in an area in the western side of our country, where the weather is temperate, with occasional days in the 90s and above in the summer, and definite coat weather with some rain (not enough) in the winter – all with humidity that feels just right. (It may seem insensitive to talk about weather at a time when the southeastern part of the country is experiencing a “storm of the century”, but perhaps this too falls into the category of “different.”)

For me, these are examples of those times, when the leaves are turning and there’s a chill in the air – and the days are getting shorter as we approach Halloween. For sports fans, football has returned, baseball is in its World Series phase, and hockey and basketball have started.

This is also the time when major elections are held, where we get to pick our leaders and policymakers for the next few years. The rhetoric is also so thick you can almost taste or touch it, as allegiances and choices can become tested and tense, leading to arguments and feelings being hurt.

In spite of the latter, I feel so fortunate I live in a country where this picking can be made without violence, without a loss of the freedoms our forefathers crafted when our country was under construction, although this election cycle has served to highlight some of the pronounced differences in class, in preferences, in lifestyles, and in predictions of terrible consequences if certain choices are made.

I’m old enough to have experienced some of our country’s bad times, such as the internment of the Japanese during World War II, and the anti-communist “witch hunts” in the 1950s. Our practices left scars on our pledge of freedom and liberty, but with the passage of time, we’ve found a way to heal.

I do have faith that whatever choices our electorate makes, that the Democracy that I feel “in the air’ will survive, and even flourish without the demonstrations of fury, violence and even death experienced in far too many places on Earth.

So, I need to remind myself to slow down a little, even stop while I smell this Democracy that’s in the air.

I firmly believe life will go on, and that other changes in the environment will occur, and that this too will be remembered as one of the “best of times.”