It is in the wee hours of the morning that I most keenly feel in touch with what rumbles inside me. It’s not the hour sunshine and gaiety. This is not the time I spend being joyful and thankful. It is in these early hours that I feel heavy with the weight of the world. It is in these moments my wrinkles crease into my brow and strands of hair gray underneath the tresses of black. I start thinking about the hungry and hurting among us. I wake up and give a kiss to Mac Daddy and my sons, even stopping to give the dog a quick scratch under his collar. In the wee hours I think about the sadness and strife our world faces and hold my breath while I say thank you for what blesses my life. There is so much to be thankful for. We have so much. Too much.
The Vel’ d’Hiv Roundup
Heard of it? Me either. Funny how history class skims over the world’s warts and only focuses on the times of jubilance (even more so when studying one’s own national history). I’m reading a book called Sarah’s Key. It has me reeling, yet I can’t put it down and go to sleep at a reasonable hour. I shed tears in the first 10 pages. It’s about the Vel’ d’Hiv’ roundup, an episode in French history that leaves a shameful mark, a time of mass arrests of Jews that started their trail to death camps. A story of mothers torn from their children, quite literally. It’s a gripping tale that will make the heart of any mother twist in crude turns and crack into jagged bits.
Sadness in Somalia
I’ve been reading the news coming from Somalia. We as Americans cannot begin to fathom this sort of devastation. There are no words. A mother who lost four of her five children within 24 hours due to famine. No clean water or food or medical attention. No escape. And worse, no hope. The reports are of a living hell on earth, an earth we share. I am horrified. Saddened. Overwhelmed. Mothers watching their babies literally starve to death. Families abandoned. The pictures don’t do the situation justice, and no number of George Clooneys can make it better. Corruption makes aid difficult, and I don’t even know what I, a mom in Raleigh, North Carolina, can do. I can’t help but look at those photos and imagine my sons’ faces on those children. Whether black or white or rich or poor, we all love our children fiercely. This is indisputable, and such love has no borders.
Homeless in America
We walk among the homeless in the corridors of our schools. I think of the countless children and mothers in shelters, without even a favorite pillow to call their own. There are struggles in this country, and no one group or stereotype bears the blame. Poverty permeates our society. Despite our best efforts to distract us with the shine of new toys and gadgets and fall hemlines and celebrity gossip, the story of poverty in America should make headline news. It’s not sexy or scandalous. Poverty is a severe problem, but we can change this. We can make not just our corner of the world better, but someone else’s too. One person, one family, one child at a time. We can help. This, I believe. We cannot let more mothers suffer while watching their children, their babies, fall to sickness and aching hearts. Can we continue to let this happen under our watch…in America?
We are in the midst of desperate times, as a country, as a planet. These are the things that haunt me in the wee hours.
It does no good to wallow or complain. It does no good to find a diversion and simply brush those thoughts aside. Ignoring our problems never works, does it? It does us some good to talk and vent and compromise and think of ways we can make our own little snapshot of society better. We can’t conquer what ails the world but we can think small and believe in the power of the ripple effect.
As the darkness bids adieu and makes way for the sun, I feel more hopeful, energized, and positive. I believe that today I can make a difference, whether small or grand does not matter. As the rays of light break against the 85 year old leaded glass panes of my front door, I see a prism scatter a rainbow of light on the wall leading upstairs to where my family sleeps. I see the blue green tones of the large painting Mac Daddy and I bought at an art gallery in Key West to mark our first anniversary. I look at it fondly and am warmed by its colors and images. It is aptly called “Beginning of a New Day.”