Someday is Not a Real Day

There's just so much about this world I can not reconcile -- especially my children with this World. Since having kids I have had many a personal reckoning about risk, inevitably, and control. I have been pleasantly surprised that motherhood has provided amazing perspective and did not send me over the edge ... at least so far. (I realize we all live very, very close to the edge.)

But lately ... lately I have been thinking quite a bit about the fierce urgency of now. That is, what are those things about my local and global community which I can and must push back against? What are the things that I should not, now, or ever, reconcile myself to?

You know that great Pablo Casals quote about how me must, "work to make this world worthy of its children." As vague and bumper sticker-ishly generic as it first seems, I love it for its truth and its broad applicability. Posed as a question to oneself, it actually becomes quite meaningful: what work am I doing to make this world worthy of our children?

Time is neutral, but action is value-driven and motion-driven. Leonard Pitts recently wrote an article about the death of two seminal figures in civil rights history. His point was that time alone does not drive change. It is the actions of people such as those profiled in his article that change the world:

"Call it the myth of inevitability. It is the mind-set that says enlightenment and progress are the inescapable byproducts of time ... time doesn't bring change. People bring change over time ... human progress does not roll in on 'wheels of inevitability.' Change is a conscious decision." -Leonard Pitts, April 26th 2010

Doc Brown urgently wanted
to save the clock tower.
What is your passion?

As my beautiful, strong, big kid loves to say, "Someday is not a real day!" After learning the days of the week she is wise to the lame art of procrastination and inaction. I am, finally and thankfully, off my ass and out of the confines of  my head on a few issues. Before my kid learned the days of the week, many things felt too broad and daunting to even know where to start. But with her help I am learning to get specific, realistic and action-oriented. At the time of this writing those are pedestrian safety, less driving, and my family's favorite collective cause: shelter animals.

So let's hear it sisters and brothers. What will you not put up with? What is untenable to you and do you actively seek to change? Do you involve your children?

cha-cha-changes

For fun I thought I might cross reference each of my new posts against my "Manifesto" and see how many of my own rules I am in violation of with each tangent. Before I even begin I feel just a hint of "stating opinions as facts" creeping in.

Anywho, what is up with new moms who are "not going to change?" Perhaps I can also pose this question to Myself Circa 2006. For more fun, mayhaps I will include a list of pronouncements and proclamations that I made while kid #1 was in the metaphorical oven.