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Just the usual stuff over at Flickr. |
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The simple act of any ordinary courageous man is not to take part, not to support lies! ... Wirters and artists can do more: they can vanquish lies! In the struggle against lies, art has always won and always will.... Lies can stand up against much in the world, but not against art. — Alexander Solzhenitsyn |
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I can be reached at romanlily ~at~gmail.com. Or you can join the notify list here. |
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November 2, 2004
Prayers for peace
Last night, just before I left the office for the day, I got an email from the neighborhood homeowner group list-serv:
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There will be a non-partisan, non-political candlelight vigil in the neighborhood tonight to help us center ourselves through peace and unity.
Let us remember the issues that connect us all: justice, security, jobs, housing. Your voice matters. Build democracy. And vote November 2nd.
Let us be reminded that on this evening we will be together as a community, in a non-partisan gathering. This is not a place for promoting or bashing any candidates. We will gather to pray for peace and unity for our nation and community.
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At the last minute we decided to go. The vigil was held in the parking lot of the Presbyterian church where we would cast our votes the next day. It was a small gathering — maybe ten of us. We stood in our t-shirts and shorts in surprisingly warm November evening in the church parking lot. A couple of elders from the church were there, and the music director from the church, too. He gave a reading from the Beatitudes, and a few people offered brief meditations and prayers for peace.
The leader of the group noted that it was All Saint's Day, and asked each of us to introduce ourselves and name a saint, someone who had passed away who had had an impact in our lives. An older black woman explained to the group that her mother was her saint. Her eyes filled with tears as she explained that her mother hadn't always had the right to vote in this country. I found my own eyes filling up as she spoke.
Sometimes such simple things reaffirm my faith in humanity.
This morning I woke extra early to see if I could get to the polls before the lines got too long. I drove up the street to the polling area, and it was a zoo. Cars were parked bumper-to-bumper along both sides of the street, signs everywhere. The line into the polling place spilled out into the parking lot and down the sidewalk.
I made my plan to outsmart the system — I'd sneak out of the office around 10:30 and come back to vote. Surely the crowds would have thinned out by then, right?
Wrong. At 10:30, the line was three times as long as it had been in the early morning!
My heart nearly broke with pride as I rounded the corner and saw the line snaking out to the sidewalk, down the street, doubling back over on itself. There was Alan, the man from up the street who goes to church. There was my next-door-neighbor Jenny, her baby daughter Stella sitting patiently in her little stroller. All these wonderful people, waiting in line for hours in the middle of the day in order in order to cast their vote.
I gave up on standing in that incredible line and headed back to the office for a second time. Finally as evening approached I slipped out of the office early to vote on the way home from work.
It felt good to vote. It felt good to participate in the life of my nation and my community in that small way.
I still don't know who's going to win this election tonight. At the moment it's looking like Bush will take it. I'm tempted to stay up late tonight biting my fingernails and worrying about what'll happen in the next four years if he does.
But I think I'll go to bed tonight, and deal with tomorrow's news tomorrow. I will choose to have faith that the world is not going to end catastrophically tonight, no matter who wins the election. As I say that, I am thinking of the tears my neighbor shed last night, thinking of how tenderly I felt toward her in that moment, how beautiful I found the sound of her broken voice. There will always be something redemptive hiding in those difficult places, like the face of my neighbor last night as she cried, looking much like a saint.
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