Blossoms Around Town
11-11 is the eleventh day of the eleventh month of our calendar. It is Veterans’ Day (still on 11-11 and not on the nearest Monday). It is a day to contemplate what I, as a citizen, can do to invert a National policy of creating war and turning our young people into soldiers and then neglecting and abusing them when they come home wounded physically and psychologically. Surely, it should be the reverse: we should be doing everything we can to avoid war and then do everything we can to take care of the health and welfare of those who have served.
11-11 is also a day for me to honor my own ancestors; it is the anniversary of the day my beloved Grandmother Rose left her body.
11-11 is a day of celebration; it is my mother’s birthday. She has said that when she was a littlge child, that she thought the parades and the day off from school were for her birthday.
11-11 is also a delightful treat of relative leisure (Federal Holiday in the middle of the week).
It is rare for me that a single day has so many different personal imports. Each day, though, indeed each moment, impacts all of us so differently depending on our life circumstances. Some of those impacts just happen; some are chosen; some are how we react both to what happens and what we choose. I’ll be enjoying my day off to the fullest, but will also be sending loving energy to those in need, especially those suffering from current and past wars.
My friend Dan posted some interesting thoughts about democracy on his blog. He is writing in the context of the Unitarian Universalist community, but the thoughts are equally applicable to our lives as citizens. The thoughts on democracy also for me highlighted what is really meant in the Bhagavad Gita about “actionless action.” To embody our spiritual practice in the way we live our lives, we serve to our best ability out of love, out of delight in acting, out of a sincere joy in serving, but we do not get attached to a particular outcome.
