Dear Friends,
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
~Dylan Thomas
From my cushioned corduroy writing corner as stars dot the sky and day is but another memory, I look out upon my world through the same eyes I’ve used for almost 54 years. I read books. I muse. I share thoughts, stories, and inspiration. I share my heart, my dreams, my aspirations. I do this to relate to you, to carve my place in the world, to make a difference.
I want to make a ripple in the pond. I want you to be in that pond with me, making more and more positive ripples.
Curled up here with my laptop, I’m holding a wooden shingle from the Loftus Store in DeSmet, South Dakota. I’m thinking about how this little square of wood has seen at least 146 years. It sat nailed to lap siding through the Long Winter of 1881 when Laura Ingalls Wilder, her family, and most of the townspeople almost starved to death. It watched all the upheaval and humanity happening all around it, when horses gave way to cars, people gave up farming, industry boomed, politics grew, haircuts and clothing styles changed, rules relaxed, tightened, relaxed, and the economic health of communities waxed and waned. It saw people through two World Wars and many military conflicts. It knows secrets, and it breathes history.
This story is not about agreeing or disagreeing with people of yore and how they conducted themselves. It is not about whether or not you like Laura Ingalls Wilder or her family. It is about time, history, humanity. It is about reflecting on what our purpose is, and on what we can do to leave this world a bit better than we found it.
The world is metaphorically (and in some places, literally) on fire. Unrest, anger, hatred, intolerance, and danger abound. Here in this Roaming the Road setting, I write about inspiration. I write about therapeutic journaling, positive habit forming, being kind, and inspecting our lives from the inside out. I can’t change the world stage. I can’t change what is happening in the big picture. But we can each change our own stage. We can control and change what is happening in our personal sphere of reach.
I’ve been to the Loftus Store. I’ve seen and stood in the place that hopeful people stood almost 150 years ago. That very same spot is where hopeful Yankton Sioux stood 200 years ago and more. Their stories are vastly different, those two groups of people, but their humanity is the same. One thing is certain, and that is the movement, change, and upheaval of the world and its people since time began. We can’t stop it, and we can’t erase the wrongs some do to others. We can, however, celebrate being alive, being human, and striving to shine light, to beat against the machine, to gallop forth in beauty, strength, and fortitude.
This shingle I hold is a witness, a survivor, and a beacon of continued hope. For these reasons, it is precious. We can hold each other up. We can model kindness and approach every interaction with love. (Okay, can we still clench our jaws and grumble in traffic at those drivers who cut us off or tailgate or stop suddenly? **sheepishly admitting I’d like to preserve that one vice**)
What I’m saying is, we must hold steady. We can be survivors, witnesses, and bearers of hope. We MUST [all caps is so necessary here!] share good news, friendship, and each extend the hand of humanity to our fellow humans, wherever we are, every single day. Let’s be keepers of that goodness, over shared bread and honey. Over tea and coffee. Over the soft murmur of shared thoughts, into the wee hours of moonlit gloaming, in that velvet hush before the fullness of night settles in.
Dylan Thomas was talking about aging and having regret at the end of our days in his poem Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night. But I want to share that it applies to us all, now, and we all must rage against the dying of the light. He meant the last of our living consciousness. I mean the light of the world, the love in the world, the goodness of shared human existence.
We are the light. We MUST be the light. Darkness prowls every corner of our every moment, trying to devour goodness and light. We mustn’t give in. We mustn’t let darkness prevail. We must win. We must make the ripples of kindness move far and wide, and each ripple begins with where we stand right now. One tiny movement sparks the ripple effect. One tiny gesture. One tiny kindness.
I ignore the darkness. I reject the hatred stage. I refuse to allow it oxygen or any space to breathe and grow. We are all different. We may look different, we may think differently than each other, we may be from different places, we may disagree on most everything.
But living, breathing, being human, having the capacity for emotion and purposeful direction, these are the things that unite us all. These are the focus. These are the cracks in the darkness where we can wiggle our toes and crook our fingers and make tiny ripples that will move out from us and hold the darkness at bay. We can’t stop night, but we can carry lanterns to light our way in the dark. We can hold our lanterns high until daybreak brings glorious rays to warm and carry us.
Please join me in raging against the dying of the light. I invite you, rather than insist, but I know you also see the urgency of keeping the bright flame of shared humanity1 illuminated. I’ll meet you at the water’s edge from right here where I am.
With my use of “humanity” here, I mean kindness, sympathy, compassion, generosity, love, goodwill, community, fellowship, kindred connection, and all other manner of connecting one to another, regardless of any differences perceived to divide us