PERSIST, PERSEVERE, AND PRESS ON

Outrage, wrath and hurtful venom are not enough. They feed on themselves and grow into ugly winding vines which cling, clog, and cause catastrophe. Yet if we don’t yell and stomp and punch our fists into walls how can we get rid of the ugly stomach-chewing- fury which claws at our insides?

We write paragraphs like the one above.

We go into the Temple and throw over some tables.

We ask questions: How can the sincerity, kindness, and decency we have observed be trampled by revenge and mean spiritedness? Why can’t honest mistakes be forgiven instead of engorged into criminal acts?

And then we go on. We pray. We hold onto to each other. We huddle against the tempest. We persist until we can at least see random rays of goodness and truth shining forth, melting demented demands: too late to destroy all their ugliness, but never too late for us to press on out of the savage storm.

SUNSETS OVER SANIBEL

I still remember the scene: me a grouchy teenager stuck with my younger siblings and cousins on a Lake Michigan beach at sunset. Who cared? All I really wanted was to snuggle up with my book back on the rented cottage’s screen porch. But as usual Dad needed more sunset pictures and my cousin and sister wanted me to jump the waves. No way. My book was better.

I do not remember the book but I do remember Dad and his pursuit to discover and photograph the ultimate sunset. My stepdad, stationed in Australia during World War II, snapped pictures from a plane during the war. After the war, he joined the Photography Club, taught me how to develop pictures in his dark room in the basement, and his sunset pictures were famous and fabulous (at least in our extended family.)

As a young family my husband and I loved giving our children memorable summertime excursions all over the United States: rafting the Grand Canyon, driving Lombard Street in San Francisco, breaking lobster claws full of succulent meat in Maine. But it is perhaps our spring vacations to Ft. Myers Beach which invoke the most memories. And often it is because of the sunsets over Sanibel. Always there. Always something to run out on the balcony and savor; or jog down to the beach and dance under. Timing our returns from shrimp dinners at a favorite restaurant, the sunsets were a must: with family pictures, walks in the waves and just good long looks.

This Spring our family is not with us for the Ft. Myers Beach sunsets. Spring Breaks, job obligations, and other family functions have taken over. But talking to my son, he asked me to “take a picture of the sunset for him.” I did. Dad would be proud I put away my book in time.