Lost

Together, can we find her?

She is pretty young, 250 years old, still learning and growing. Her beauty is stunning. Frothy glittering waves rolling onto white sandy beaches, mountains that reach all the way up to the clouds and wear hats of snow, deserts that break out in bloom after the rain.

Clearly besotted, you might suspect I don’t know about how she lured people, with tales of land and beauty, to come from all over the globe, and then they stole the land from the people who could still see spirit in every living thing. How others were kidnapped and brought in chains to become the economic engine of people who felt entitled to their labor. Blood was shed on her soil with brothers killing brothers.

I could go on and on about her imperfections. Fortunately, for children, dogs, and countries, perfection is not the criterion for unconditional love.

Last night, sitting on the couch, eating leftovers, I was half-listening and watching the newscaster drone on. My consciousness was dormant and hijacked by mindlessly playing FreeCell on my phone, my go-to news coping mechanism. But images of starving children holding out their pots for food, their skeletal mothers holding skeletal babies in front of houses blown to smithereens penetrated the scaffolding of my mind and blew me awake.

Not being able to reach into the screen and give them all a good meal, the tears flow down my cheek. I have enjoyed a lifetime feeding everyone- hosting the big holiday family meals, preparing thousands of meals for family, friends, cats, dogs, birds, and donating regularly to the World Kitchen. I can’t bear starving children.

“Why are you crying?” my husband asks with concern while handing me a tissue.

“We are doing this. We supplied the bombs. We let Israel cut off aid. We are complicit.”

Grief mingles with hopelessness, and part of me wants to crawl back to the comfort of my stupor.

I am not totally oblivious. Last year, when USAID was dismantled, throwing my neighbors and friends who were aid workers out of work, they told me, with worry in their voices, the consequences would be deadly. At the No Kings protest march, I saw a sign that said over 2,000 people are dying each day due to the shuttering of clinics, humanitarian aid, and scientific research. Is this who we are now?

Ebola is raging in the Congo, left undetected until it spread because it emerged in a rural mining area where humanitarian aid workers usually serve as an early warning system. But they are no longer there.

My husband, already weary from trying to save the humans from extinction despite a collective intentional ignorance of our climate in crisis, has learned to stay focused and accept that he is already doing everything he can, however insufficient it may seem.

Maybe my memory and grief are for a country that never really existed. I remember being so proud of being an American. We were the ones standing up for what is right and good, being good neighbors with Canada, nurturing Democracy, standing up to Fascism, striving for free and fair elections, and extending aid to those in need.

Our outstretched arms promising:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”
Where is that country?

Actually, I believe she is still there. Just not in the headline news. Together, people continue to respond with kindness, help each other in need, do what we can for those in far-flung places who need our support, and take a stand when things aren’t right. Together, I am confident, we will love our country back to its mooring and promise of freedom and respect for all.