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SUM OF OUR CITIZENS
Monday Jan. 18, 2016
When we sleep, we dream – everyone does.
Awake, giving voice to dreams, risks failures. Risks everything. What else are dreams for? Dreaming is planning – yes, of course it is.
Dreaming, a hopeful movie, but awake – we write our own script.
A dream.
The whole thing.
Dr. King’s dream has not been realized.
Progress? Yes, but so much poverty, mistrust and injustice remain. Sad legacies unrepaired.
Our American friends hold no exclusive on injustices. Seeing South Africa, praise progress, yes, but ‘they’ve only just begun’. See China, ‘hasn’t begun yet’. Study middle-east messes where races, sects and faiths have, for thousands of years, proven they cannot get along – or legitimately demonstrate they believe …
Smugness is no Canadian entitlement either.
We’ve our own legacy, hundreds of years, treating first peoples as last peoples – marginalized, ignored, mistreated, disinherited. We could blame them. So many of us continue that crap. Could blame hundreds of years, misguided politicians and bureaucrats.
But hold on, WE are the current owners. If this land is your land, this land is my land … WE must own our mess. If our country (or anyone’s) is the sum of its citizens, then we own responsibility for our chronic failures. Just as we proudly take credit for what is good in our land, we must own responsibility for fixing what is so horribly gone wrong.
We must acknowledge, dream, inspire, plan – but when we wake up, we must work. Planning, without action seems too much like government and too little like citizenship.
More dreams, remembrance, praise for great dreamers. And rebels. And those who shake up status quos. Dream? Yes. Do? More.
Mark Kolke
written / published from Calgary, AB
morning walk: -2C/29F, overcast and milder – some light snow overnight made our trek a tad slippery but we found our way, Gusta found her spot, and we were off again. Traffic Monday-usual steady, my day off to a great early start with much to do …
Reader feedback:
OH MY
5,000 days - I had to do the math ...is 13.7 years, 166 months. I could not do the same task ever for that period of time, except maybe go to bed and wake up the next morning. Congratulations!!!!!!, DG, Edmonton, AB
Happy 5000 Mark. What a fabulous accomplishment. And you have achieved a writing milestone that is amazing, LG, Calgary, AB
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