Limitations...feh!

The entry below is from my personal page for the AIDS LifeCycle event I'm participating in on June 3-9.  I took last week off out of my training schedule to be with my daughter for her wedding and it is an experience I am profoundly grateful to have been a part of and when this bicycle ride is over, I'll write about it (I promise!).  Besides, they're on their honeymoon right now and I have to have some pictures to include.  Having missed that week of training proved that no good deed, truly, does not go unpunished.  I got my two-wheeled comeuppance yesterday.

They grow so quickly...sounds kinda cliché doesn't it, but it's true. On the left, my daughter at about 3 and on the right, me dancing with her at her wedding.

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I’m not generally one to kvetch unless it’s with a bit of tongue in-cheek. Well, maybe if I have a good audience, but most people who know me might criticize me for bottling up my complaints and angst and my doctor will likely look over the top of his half-moon glasses and chide me about my blood pressure as a result! That is, if I had an avuncular physician with whom I had been developing one of those Marcus Welby-esque relationships. In reality, I can’t remember the name of the last doctor I saw at the VA, but I do remember that I couldn’t pronounce it!

That said, I put in 63 of the most grueling miles on my bicycle yesterday.  That 50-65 range must be my punishment limit when it comes to difficult riding.  My first real long-distance ride where I had to hang it up was the 2009 Minnesota Ironman Bicycle Ride.  The cold, the rain, and the nasty wind all conspired to make me, once again, question my sanity for doing this. For fun, no less! Yesterday’s ride was nothing like that. It was misty and calm in the early morning, but turned out to be a beautiful, sunny day…and filled with a *lot* of climbing. Suffice it to say, we don’t have them thar kind of hills in Minnesota.

I had reached my limit.

I would far rather reach my limit where I am with a group or had support crew than out in the middle of the great hinterlands, but it’s a touch painful and humiliating when you get there.  As a younger man, I was immortal like all my compadres, but now as someone who is pushing 50, not so much. I’m feeling the aches and pains of middle age that tend to be amplified by endurance sports; I’m having a really difficult time of dropping that extra pound; and my doctor with the unpronounceable name is being more serious about my all-American diet.  Limitations are becoming more than a number on my credit card statement.

I think it’s fair to say that we can be grateful that self-imposed limitations can be pushed over like a house of cards, but it’s also fair to say that ignoring other limitations is unwise, unsafe, or irresponsible.

So, what do thoughts on limitations have to do with this event? We train as a team and watch out for each other with an emphasis on safety. We make sure everyone is getting enough water. If you’ve ever been cut off by some hot-shot cyclist, you’ll understand why we make it a point to scrupulously observe traffic laws. Yes, Mr. Eastwood, “a man has got to know his limitations,” but more than that, without them, our focus is self-directed and self-centered and this 545-mile trek becomes a colossal ego trip rather than a labor of love.  So, I'm navigating my limitations, pushing past some discomfort and pain, but watching the ones that further the reason this event exists.

Thank you to my latest heroes:  Jim & Carol Semelroth, Jay Lickfett, Ellen DeYoung, and Karen Nichols, all from my spiritual home in Mission Viejo: Tapestry Unitarian Universalist Congregation; my long-timer friend who makes me laugh out loud and talented writer, Christine Mounts; and a Utah friend who has an easy smile and a big heart, Sean Bollinger.

And thank you all who continue to encourage me. It means the world to me and even more to those for whom I'm riding.

This posting was originally published May 6, 2012. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing

The Invsible People

Each week, I update my AIDS LifeCycle page with an entry talking about the ride, my preparation, what I'm doing, and why I'm doing it.  No sane person (well, I guess I should say no typical person) spends so much time in the saddle for people they've never met, so there's always a bit of a back story as to why I put my own skin into this HIV/AIDS game if I don't have the disease or have known someone who has been one of its fatal victims. Call it what you will, I'll just say that it's important to give where I can.  And this is one way.  I've re-posted the entry below from my post today:

Not so many years ago, a diagnosis of HIV was treated with the gravity of any other terminal condition and the message, “get your affairs in order.” For the most part and something we can be grateful for, the graphic images of the slow, painful, and humiliating deaths of people from the ravages of AIDS are rare. In Minnesota, where I just moved from, infection rates are the highest since 1992.  Here in California there are nearly 109,000 people are living with HIV and across the nation, there are some 1.1 million of us living with HIV and AIDS. The fact remains:

AIDS IS NOT OVER.

When I first looked into HIV and AIDS in this country, I didn’t realize it was still such a problem. I just didn’t see the suffering and hear of people losing friends in terms of recent history. That was the case, mostly because of the success of anti-retroviral drugs and progressive research. People who were infected were living longer and walking out of hospice care on their own two feet rather than on a gurney en route to their own funerals. I just never knew anyone with HIV. Well, truthfully, it’s just that I didn’t know that there were people around me, including friends and even one family member, who were HIV-positive. And I’ll bet it’s the same with you: you know someone with HIV and just don’t know it!

They are the invisible people.

They are male and female, gay and straight, young and old. I know people all along that spectrum and I’ve seen that without a doubt, HIV is no respecter of its host. And as a result, there has been a fear of the disease that has pushed discussion about prevention and treatment off the table as if somehow ignoring it will make it go away. We know what does and does not cause the spread of HIV, yet…

The stigma persists.

A couple of weeks ago, I participated in the Paul Hulse Century, a 100-mile ride put on by a group of cyclists called “Positive Pedalers.” These are among the many today who are living with HIV rather than dying from AIDS. Most of them wear bright red jerseys with “Eliminating stigma through our positive public example” emblazoned on them. Without exception, the Positive Pedalers I have met do exactly that. They tend to be the most upbeat people I know in spite of the fact that they happen to be carrying around a disease that will take their lives if left unchecked. They refuse to be invisible.

Most still equate AIDS with a death sentence and to be clear, AIDS is a killer. But it doesn’t have to be. We need to talk about HIV and AIDS to prevent the upcoming generation from infection, we need to continue medical research to make treatment options more affordable and effective, and we need to take care of those who have the disease because quite frankly, a society is measured by the way it takes care of those who need help. And that’s where this event – and you and I – come into the picture. We all can make a positive difference.

Thank you to my latest supporters:  My uncle, Mr. Don Jacobson and Carolyn Bennion; my cousin Dan “Jake” Jacobson; my high school swimming teammate, fellow CAP cadet, and all around great guy, Rick Fullmer and his wife Judith; riding buddy (who more often than not, kicks my rear tire into gear) Shelly Weir and her partner Candy Koogler; and my co-worker, Debbie Zissis.

Re-posted from my AIDS LifeCycle page at www.tofighthiv.org/goto/toddpark

Please donate today. It will mean the world of difference to people living with HIV/AIDS.

This posting was originally published April 22, 2012. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing

Why Am I Doing This Crazy Thing

Anyone who knows me knows that I like to ride.  I cycle long-distances for a lot of reasons, one of which is that I can combine my enthusiasm for the sport with a charitable act and make the world just a little bit better.  Currently, I'm training for the 11th annual AIDS LifeCycle - an event that  raises money for HIV and AIDS while moving some 3,000 cyclists 545 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles over the course of seven days.  No small feat, but AIDS is no small problem to overcome either.

For every person who rides in the AIDS LifeCycle, there's a back story. In my case, it's because I wrote an article a few years ago. My editor sent me an email with a point of contact for the Minnesota Red Ribbon Ride and I did a quick interview with the executive director, Theresa Fetsch. Her boundless enthusiasm was only the tip of the iceberg for an organization that supports eight AIDS service organizations throughout the state. My next interview was with someone who had participated in a number of these rides and was also HIV-positive. He invited me to come to a training ride to meet a number of people participating to get a better feel for what the event was all about.

At the time I had a mountain bike, but I pushed through the 37 miles of rural Minnesota and I met all manner of people that spanned my expectations including husband-wife teams and one guy riding a BMX bike with a fox tail flapping from the seat...and for the first time I knew, I met people living with HIV instead of dying from AIDS. I made a good will donation to one of the riders I interviewed and after filing my story, I thought that would be the last I heard of the event. I was clearly wrong. For the next several weeks, literally everywhere I turned, I ran into people who were participating, raising money, holding fundraisers, and somehow connected to this Red Ribbon Ride.

Clearly, the universe was speaking.

The next year, I committed to ride in the 2009 Minnesota Red Ribbon Ride. At the risk of sounding cliché, it changed my life and my attitude toward the disease. Oh, and I found that despite my previous assertions, I knew quite a few people who were affected by HIV and AIDS; and some of them were friends of mine. I rode again in 2010 before being transferred to Southern California for work. In 2011, I met some local cyclists and rode the Orange County Ride for AIDS a single day, 100-mile event.

And I registered for the 11th AIDS LifeCycle.

But this is not about me. That is the unwavering message that flashes before me when I grow weary at down-shifting into low gear to go up yet another hill. It is the thing that is branded into my brain as I drag myself out of bed early on Saturdays when, like every other working stiff, I should be sleeping in...at least until 8:00, right? And it is the thing I *must* remember when I'm really, really tired from having put in so many miles I just want to quit. It's not about me...and I need you, my faithful supporters, heroes, and friends, that this champion saddling the two-wheeled steed cannot win the battle for those unable to fight without your help.

Thank you to my latest supporters:

Duane Vajgrt and Jeff Benedick from the OCRA; Fred Kilby and his mother Mary; Dr. Sarah Jerome, the best optometrist ever and my constant supporter; Kathy Michaels (our dog's adopted aunt!); Fred Subia, my first real friend here in the OC; Martin & Lada, my Czeck amigos (how's that for mixing things up?!); Jay Casper, childhood buddy and little league teammate; Bobbie Kollar, my high school classmate who extended the welcome mat when I moved into the realm of the Orange Curtain; Jay Miller, genuinely big-hearted and long-time Minneapolis acquaintance; Lois Elfman, editor extraordinaire; and most importantly, my family my daughter, Nichole; my mom, Annie Thompson; my aunt Susana Jacobson; my grandparents, Mr. & Mrs. JS Jacobson; and my sister in-law, Angela Thomson-Brenchley.

Re-posted from my AIDS LifeCycle page at www.tofighthiv.org/goto/toddpark

Please donate today.  It will mean the world of difference to people living with HIV/AIDS.

This posting was originally published April 22, 2012. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing

Dude, That's Intense!

After 100 miles on a bicycle...great day all around!

The old saying, “A picture’s worth a thousand words” could never be truer than in someone’s facial expression when I say, “I’m riding my bicycle 100 miles.” Eyes usually widen with disbelief, followed by a little slack jaw.  Maybe one eyebrow is above the other to say Yeah, right. More often than not, the sentiment I get here in Southern California is “Dude, that’s intense!” Have no doubt that the surfer dialect has been thoroughly integrated into the Queen’s English in this part of the country.

October 15 marked the third time I’ve mounted my bicycle to raise money for organizations that help people living with HIV and AIDS. It may come across as trite to say that my life was changed by participating in an event like this. But, to a person, everyone I’ve spoken with who gets involved finishes with a different outlook on both the disease and the people as a whole. As a freelance writer, I’ve penned articles that address the pandemic that is AIDS, the statistics, and the impact that the disease has made.  It’s not pretty…and it’s not over.

There is more to the story than the cold facts, even though some of those facts are pointing at people living with HIV rather than dying from AIDS. Granted, we tend to focus on the important rather than the urgent when we are faced with the prospect of our own mortality, but far from self-pity, my experience with the people who are HIV-positive on these rides has been nothing short of inspirational.  The courage, enthusiasm, and attitude give my petty complaints a healthy smack-down and lift me back up with a revitalized perspective. I have also had the opportunity to meet an incredible cadre of dedicated people who span every segment of society who just want to do something to help.

Suffice it to say, during the course of the many, many miles cycled in training and the events themselves, there’s a tremendous amount of time where the only thing around is the road and nothing else.  I’ve ridden through the farmlands of Minnesota where I saw nothing but corn fields for as far as the eye could see and the thin strip of asphalt pulling me onward in spite of a saddle-sore posterior, aching shoulders and knees, and numbed hands. It brings you to your physical and emotional end at some point and you come to the stark realization that it’s not about you, numbskull! The very memory of that epiphany brings a healthy lump to my throat. It’s amazing to find a fellow veteran rider where in an instant, we communicate the unsaid about coming to that particular point and the tears come.  Deep indeed calls to deep.

People don’t want to talk about disease as if speaking its name invokes some horrible demon who will inflict suffering. The sad irony is that talking about HIV and what causes it can prevent it. Certainly, there’s a time and place for certain sensitive subjects, but to avoid the uncomfortable nature of sexually transmitted infections or to assert that HIV is divine retribution for deviating from some arbitrary plan is analogous to pointing an accusing finger at an innocent child for contracting cancer.  It’s time to look past the why someone has a physical infirmity of any kind and look toward improving their lives.

Here’s the crux of what I want to say: you can—we all can—make a difference in someone’s life.  It’s not in my nature to play the guilt card on someone, but I can say for me, I think it’s crucially important to get outside the comfort zone and give out of my abundance.  I may not be wealthy, but I have enough. That said, giving does make me wealthy in a way. Whether it’s in writing a check to a charitable organization or raising funds for a cause, I feel it is my obligation to improve someone’s life much the same way I felt it crucial to serve my country in the US Navy. Fundraising is not my forté, but it has taught me well that those with the most generous heart aren’t always the ones with the biggest donations. It also proved to me that friendship is tried when money is involved and those friends who not only throw you a couple of clams toward making a fundraising goal are more likely to be there for you when you really need them. What has touched me the most was receiving a donation from people who sacrificed out of their own need.  It brought back the best of what spirituality has to teach us all and flies in the face of those who would use their brand of religion to condemn rather than heal. The parable of the “Good Samaritan” never resonated more.

While I have the physical ability and strength, I can participate in these events for someone else; while I have time, I can do something or just be with one who needs a helping hand or a smiling face; and of course, while I have financial resources, I’ll continue to be as generous as I can. If you want to feel fulfilled, I encourage you to find a cause you can throw yourself into and give someone a meal, a smile, a reason to hope.  I encourage you to make a positive difference…I can’t guarantee it’ll change your life like it did mine, but then again, you never know.  It just might be intense, dude!

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The event I rode in was the Orange County Ride for AIDS. While it wasn’t the point of this post, I hope you’ll consider donating toward my 545-mile bicycle trek from San Francisco to Los Angeles in the 2012 AIDS LifeCycle.  You can visit my page here…or you can ride with me. I’d be honored to have you along. If HIV/AIDS isn't the charity of choice for you, find what inspires you and get involved.  You'll be *so* glad you did!

This posting was originally published November 8, 2011. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing

While There's Time

Having just returned from my high school reunion, I got to experience first-hand, the leveling effect of time on people. My high school years weren’t filled with the stuff of musicals or angst-ridden movie teens, but my coming of age was replete with cliques and hormone-induced drama just like every other school. In walking up to a group of classmates after thirty years, you no longer see the jocks, nerds, or girls you were too timid to ask out.  You just see a bunch of people, some of which have a vaguely familiar look to them and some of them even have a name that falls out of the cobwebs of the addled middle-aged brain!

The lines of our faces seem to be more pronounced in spite of the latest overpriced cosmetic unguents and surgical procedures and to be sure, quite a number of us show signs of having weathered a storm or two. Everyone had filled out and a few of us kept filling out…although I noted one guy who had been rather rotund in high school looking really good. I actually didn’t recognize him at all until someone said his name and then the face came through like one of those magic eye 3-D puzzles. The big 80s hair had been replaced by low-maintenance cuts or in the case of some, receding hairlines.

Instead of comparing possessions or bank balances, we were sharing pictures of loved ones, tales of overcoming, and smiles.  The passage of time brought us together instead of keeping us in our own little groups. At the end of the day, isn’t that what life is all about? It’s simply relationships, families, and community. I met classmates who had formed the more traditional family and were enjoying the fruits of their love in multiple generations. But more often than not, few of us—even in conservative Utah—were still in those traditional families.  Some of us divorced and remarried and some of us never married, happy to live a solitary life to pursue a career or a life dream.  Some of us found our love in someone of the same gender and some of us are simply living with someone else with nothing but authentic affection and commitment tying the relationship together. Nobody was particularly concerned about the politics of someone’s relationship, just that they were happy and healthy.

Sure, it’s naïve of me to think that this kind of harmony extends past that evening at the Salt Lake Hilton, yet I do believe at some level, it’s not outside the realm of possibility.  Rather it’s what should be the norm. You see, the thing that brought us together outside of the obvious was simply that we were face-to-face and we wanted to reconnect. As I look in our technologically-dependent culture, it’s clear that what has driven us apart is the lack of human interaction. Unfortunately, there are those who will use that particular lack to ensure the influential retain their sway on their unwitting subjects.  Powerbrokers and kingmakers alike know how to dehumanize and disenfranchise, but there’s something about human contact that levels the playing field. Seeing the lines on another’s faces force us to recognize that each wrinkle was earned at a cost—some certainly from age, but as well some from pain. And empathy is something a statistic can never impart.

It’s far easier to log on to Facebook than it is to walk next door and sit down with your neighbor.  It’s far easier to type out feedback to an article that presents an opposing view to our own rather than to employ critical thought and pull out the points we do happen to agree with. It’s far easier for a politician to jump on a plane and go to the home district for the routine extended weekend than to pound out genuine bipartisan legislation that requires actual compromise and empathy for constituents.

The Internet has made it possible to keep current on so many things in an instant and with the advent of social networking, we’re able to participate in a sanitized version of the lives of our family, friends, and acquaintances. The Internet has given a voice to those who were the invisible people of yesterday. Yet that same power has had an unanticipated effect of driving us back into our own adult cultural, political, and philosophical cliques. While it’s no surprise to anyone that people congregate with those much like themselves, the thing that is missing from the equation is the civility that comes from knowing our neighbors. We may disagree with one another, but the level of openly displayed rancor has a de-sensitizing effect and it redefines what had been heretofore normal and civil—and not in a good way. Modern day messiahs of hatred are ascending by the day, appealing to pliable minds, inciting them into a frenzy of moralistic thinking that is based on blatantly incorrect figures, manipulative theology, and outright fear, reminiscent of pre-WWII Germany.

It’s just far easier to be anonymous than to forge real relationships. Relationships, families, and communities are messy. They require that we become vulnerable and show that our hairlines and wrinkles are the prizes for working through difficult issues, that our scars are indeed beautiful because they prove we heal. And they require that we listen more than we speak. Sure, we get angry and we fight and cry together, but in time, we remember the important things. It's time to unplug and reconnect with each other. The entertainment will still be there later, but the people in our lives may not be. We have to make a positive difference…while there’s time.

This posting was originally published August 30, 2011. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing

Dreams Deferred

My son and I just had a very long phone conversation. He called to share some news with me that he had been waiting for, and unfortunately, it wasn’t good. He was working toward a profession that would not only help others, but would be a lot of fun as well.  He found an organization called I-TEC (Indigenous People's Technology and Education Center) that was founded by the son of his hero, for lack of a better term. My son got the opportunity to meet him and express appreciation for the work the organization does.  He was excited beyond words when an offer came back that would help him get his private pilot’s license and the requisite follow-on ratings to do the humanitarian work the company does in return for construction skills.  My son’s Facebook postings were full of the kind of enthusiasm that dreams are made of and the kind of wording that let me know he was still a kid inside [Click here to see his blog]. However, that unbridled enthusiasm was dashed in the blink of an eye when the news from the FAA came yesterday. It ruled that he was physically unqualified to pilot an aircraft although his congenital conditions had been surgically corrected. It shattered his dream.

“So, what’s next?” I cautiously asked him.  His response was remarkable and something that made me very proud of him, especially in light of this blow.  He said that he knew that he was in a place where he was supposed to be and that even if he wasn’t in the pilot’s seat, he would continue in the humanitarian work in which the organization is engaged. It took me back to the day when I was exactly his age and the same verdict had been passed down to me by a navy flight surgeon: NPQ - not physically qualified. I remember the utter disappointment, the devastation, I felt when those three little letters were stamped on my pre-commissioning physical form.  Like him, I had made a commitment, and I knew where I was supposed to be. I shared that story with him and how five years later a door was opened that allowed me to fulfill my dream of being a pilot.  Had I not gone forward on a positive note the day I got my own bad news and gave my best efforts, the door would have remained bolted shut, so I told him to be the best at whatever he does so that if a door can be opened, someone will show him the way through.

The other thing that his response told me was more important than allowing me to comfort him with my own success story.  It told me that my son was becoming a man.  Sure, he towers over me at 6’-3” but it was dealing with this kind of situation with grace and maturity that told me that my boy was growin’ up! And that—more than the empathy of some medical authority’s ruling raining on my son’s parade—brought a tear to my eye.  While so many of us would have complained about the injustice of it all, about how bad things happen to good people, and any other kind of excuse, he took the figurative road less traveled. Sure, he’s grieving the death of a dream, but it’s clear that he will be fine in short order…and who knows?  That dream may have soap opera qualities and re-surface out of a dramatically impossible situation and allow him to fly after all. One can have hopes, right?  After all, dreams are the stuff of hopes.  I, if anyone, should know that. I got to live my dream, something for which I will be forever grateful.

I can’t stop there, though, because a genuine gratitude journal should be refreshed daily.  Having my son call me and pour out his heart over this disappointment was, in and of itself, something that filled me with gratitude for him. Despite the continent that divides us, nothing can separate matters of the heart and of trust. The old adage of ‘like father, like son,’ wasn’t lost on me when he chose to go into aviation and it wasn’t lost on me again yesterday when at the very age I had my own road block put in front of me, he did as well.  He may not get a chance to fly as I did, but I believe he will still find the dream that will both fulfill his heart and make all of us envious of his accomplishment.  After all, we’re already very proud of him.  Who wouldn’t be?

I am not prone to schadenfreude and certainly do not revel in my own trials and tribulations, but I am excited to see what kinds of adventures and experiences he has as a result of this detour.  My own dream detour took me to Europe and gave me experiences with people who taught me incredible things about humanity, about other cultures, and ultimately resulted in the very man who is navigating his own road today.  It’s a good reminder that the road on which we travel will always have rough patches that slow us down and sometimes put us out of commission for a while, but the road continues on whether we like it or not.  The only question is which road we will travel. Having experienced infamous LA traffic first hand, I can tell you that the analogy is as true in life as it is for commuting.  It may come at you at break-neck speed or it may come to a stop in a frightening instant, but the road does indeed get you where you’re supposed to be…eventually!

Dreams deferred hurt like hell.  There’s just no other way to say it. Yet, without exception, everyone I’ve ever spoken to that is living their dream says that timing was everything. And rather than chalking it all up to blind, dumb luck, I prefer Seneca’s definition of luck being where preparation and opportunity come together. The ‘lucky’ ones? Seems to me they sure do work hard. And my son? Yeah, he’s a lucky one, even though it may not look like it today.  No doubt, he’ll be making a positive difference on the road ahead of him.

 

This posting was originally published August 7, 2011. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing.

The cure to a Bi-Polar Congress: Genuine Leadership

I’ve been struggling with the increasing polarization of my country.  In a nation that was founded on the premise of E Pluribus Unum (lit: out of many, one), those with the loudest voice and the most outlandish accusation are driving a wedge into our national identity and inflicting all manner of harm, both imagined and very real. It’s not enough that we were divided to the point of civil war that took 600,000 lives and wounded another million 150 years ago. We’re picking fights about everything, newscasters and televangelists alike are proclaiming mayhem in the streets and that the ‘end is nigh!’ Are we beating plowshares back into swords?  Did we not learn enough bloody lessons along the way? Civility? It’s becoming relegated to an entry in the dictionary. (For those of you who were born after 1984 when the PC was making its advent, the dictionary is a book with paper pages and it tells you what words mean and it uses all letters…no numbers…gr8!). Once again, families are divided against themselves and friendships are being tested to their limits.  One more example as of late is the financial reputation of the United States—the richest nation in the history of the planet—being monkeyed with and putting us back on the road to recession or worse. And it’s all in the name of partisan bickering.

There was a time when I revered my elected officials as people worthy of respect.  They cared about the people in their districts in the spirit of public service and patriotism. Rolled-up shirt sleeves weren’t done so for a photo-op, but because they were actually working long hours. Members of Congress stayed in Washington, worked into the wee hours of the morning, and actually collaborated with each other to forge alliances and create incredibly complicated projects that were the envy of the entire world.  They came together and set an example for the rest of us common folk, making a way to send astronauts into space and ultimately to the moon; they worked to build the Interstate highway system; and they made it possible for imposing, gleaming edifices of American infrastructure to be built. Our federal government has made sure our air is breathable and our water is safe for both mankind and wildlife. It paved the way for groundbreaking medical research and made our lives immeasurably more comfortable. While you may be longing for the idyllic life of Leave it to Beaver and Father Knows Best, open that window and let the heat in. It’s the big, bad ol’ government that built the TVA and the Hoover Dam and offered incentives to make our electrical service grid support all those air conditioning units. And let’s not forget the countless millions of people around the globe benefitting from the philanthropy of the American people by way of foreign aid payments. That you’re reading this on the Internet is another benefit of US federal government innovation. The World Wide Web had its beginning as a military application. Would that kind of cooperation happen in today’s Congress?  Sadly, I doubt it.

Of course, the same power that wrought such wonders of human achievement has also been the author of unthinkable destruction and irresponsibility on scales that boggle the mind. While both those extremes can coexist without imploding is something that will be one of those great unsolvable mysteries.  Criticism of that same complex system is something as well that makes it all the more magnificent. I’m not the first to tell you our system of government has some flaws, but in total, it has the greatest potential of any in modern history. That is frankly because our system is, in Abraham Lincoln’s words, “of the people, by the people, for the people.” It is our people whose character has had the right combination of bravery, humility, and ingenuity that has built a nation that is the envy of all others.  That combination, however, seems to have been bought by special interests on both sides of the political spectrum to where we now have to major parties that I simply call, the party of “No!” and “No backbone!” 

Republicans have raised the issue of unemployment and the economy as the key issue during the mid-term election and won handily in districts that have traditionally been considered “swing” areas. To date, they have focused on tightening down on social issues (abortion, gay rights, education, etc.) to placate the newly empowered, so-called “tea party” brand of conservatives. Democrats, on the other side of the aisle, could have passed virtually anything they wanted during the 2008 and 2009 legislative sessions, but tried to be all things to all people—an impossibility and a recipe for certain disaster. To their credit, they slowed the growing unemployment figures, but they’re stagnant as is the economy. So, rather than making a difference, petty partisan arguments and mud-slinging have become de rigueur and we are marching toward the day when the debt ceiling becomes our own financial Armageddon.

Let’s put aside for a moment the state of our fragile economic recovery. Let’s put aside for a moment the fact that debt ceiling has been raised a stunning 74 times since 1962, with not even the batting of an eyelash by either party. Even if this were the first time the ceiling was in jeopardy of being reached, the consequences of doing nothing or standing one’s ideological ground to cut spending are so monumental, so disastrous, that to dance this close to the precipice of default is not only irresponsible on a scale not ever imagined, it’s criminal, especially in light of the fact that it’s a problem of the Congress’ own making…that they’ve known about for months. The headlines today read more like a parenting magazine than governmental politics as Republican leaders act like spoiled, errant children who didn’t get the right flavor of lollipop with the Democrats as the permissive parents. Democrats don’t fare much better, stooping to mockery of the President in his negotiating.

We don’t need any more posturing.  We don’t need any more clever sound bites. We don’t need any more theatrical righteous indignation. This is not, after all, the World Cup.  It is, to quote Bill Clinton, “the economy, stupid!” What we, the people, want and need is simple: leadership. We need our elected officials to do is lead.  Representatives, Senators, Mr. President: that requires some cooperation on your collective part and if it means staying late and burning a whole lot of midnight oil like you used to, then you damned well better do it.  That’s what we elected you to do and that’s what we expect. If you are unwilling or unable to do that, perhaps it’s time you resign.  And when you’re on your way out and checking your badges in at the door, perhaps we should change the rules on benefits.  Unless you’ve been with ‘the company’ for at least 20 years, you have no ongoing benefits…just like the rest of us.

So, please, come together and remind me why our system of government is better, why I entrust my livelihood and security to the people I vote for every November. Remember that we are the United States of America, not blue and red states, not Republicans and Democrats. Make a positive difference: LEAD!

This posting was originally published July 24, 2011. I've split my writing into different blogs: Opinion, The Leukemia Chronicles, and other Freelance Writing