The poppies just keep on growing.
While the new president tries to instill a return to civility and order, the old one hopes the legal sledgehammer currently being lifted in New York somehow fails to crack open the coconut of various misgivings that will soon create an Excedrin headache all the Tylenol Extra Strength in Palm Beach will not quell.
Meanwhile, elected government officials argue along party lines largely for the sake of self-puffery with little regard for serving the public good and everyone wants free money, even if he or she said they didn’t.
Why can’t we all just get along?
House confinement is not something Americans do well, nor apparently is relying on civil discourse more than confrontation. Never in my lifetime did I dream such a mess was possible (much less thriving) in the America I knew as a lad.
When I was a child, all I did each day was rise and shine with hopes of finding friends to play with. Why, pray tell, has such a simple ambition morphed into something so complicated? People argue over things they cannot change but ignore the things they can. American civility — respectfully discoursing problems and seeking amenable solutions for the collective good — has turned into poppycock fantasy.
But why?
Technology bears the brunt of the blame. Bombast-on-demand for anyone with a keyboard seeking to blather self-import in order to prove that Maslow knew what he was talking about at levels three and four: people starve for love and acceptance, and then respect. Who better to demand it than ourselves?
“What you feed your mind, your body will want.” I know this is true because I heard Robin Quivers say it one morning on the Howard Stern Show. Fill our faces with noise from dawn to midnight and we’ll wake up eating more. The solution, of course, is to change how you spend your time, look at life, and widen the aperture of daily tasks to incorporate broader perspectives.
The world these days, at least in America, is overgrown with tall poppies. In a horizon full of poppies, the tallest stand out. The tallest get chopped down. The smallest are never seen. The question each of us needs to be asking is: Why did decide to be a poppy in the first place?
There’s too much noise out there, too much barking braggadocio for attention’s sake, and too much self-centered messaging. Life is easier when we give instead of take, yet the nation seems increasingly self-absorbed.
I, for one, am tired of it all. I yearn to return to the fabric of the society in which I was raised. If the old days were sheep’s wool, today’s are synthetics. Cheaper and quicker. Not as good but who cares?
We should.
Like Gandhi said, “Be the change you wish to see in the world.” Today is a pretty nice time to start.
Ocean Palmer