Another Credo

The snow has finally arrived here in the Northwoods. There was some concern that this might be the first Christmas without snow since 2015. They shouldn’t have worried. I’ve been watching snowfalls for a long, long time now and they never seem to get old. They are often surprising and exciting. Sometimes frightening and threatening. For many of us, comforting and reassuring. We in snow country often use snowstorms as historical signposts. “Remember that 24 incher in ’78?” I can recall snowfalls from my childhood as clearly as if they happened yesterday. The skiers and snowmobilers are happy, and we can joyfully start our journey into this new year.

The snow also reminds me that despite the chaos of this past year, somethings remain constant. Perhaps this is one of the best parts about growing old – we seniors get to comfort our children by our very presence. We are living proof that we will not be defeated. Proof that we can rise up and recover even when terrible things happen. We can remind them that this has nothing to do with “being a hero”; it simply means doing the right thing at the right time to the best of your ability. It is also critical that we remember it does little good to directly say these things. My kids seldom heard my lectures - I know I never heard my Dad’s - but I know they were watching me. Especially when I was confronted with difficult choices. Especially when I was wrong. What did I do to make things better when I made a mistake? How did I help solve the problems I may have caused?

2021 will force us to come to terms with the same question. What can I do to make things better in 2021?

Read more.

I know this is easier for those of us with the time and temperament, but I know reading is more deliberative for me. I can engage the ideas of a writer in a more reflective manner and more easily see if they make sense. This can also work with those who enjoy hearing books because the audio book business is thriving. (The Wisconsin Public Library Consortium has a huge digital library available to all.)  I recognize the irony of advocating reading using a computer screen. I was once a hard cover book zealot who swore he would never use a Kindle to read books. That lasted until my children gave me one as a gift and I discovered I could carry an entire collection of e-books and audio books to read at my pleasure. Don’t misunderstand. The experience of holding and reading a hard cover book is still sacred for me, but reading is still reading. I can read the words of people who lived thousands of years ago or who walked on the moon. We all have much to learn. I will make more time to read.

Watch More Carefully.

We are bombarded with visuals now days. New technology makes tv and computer screens almost irresistible. It doesn’t seem to matter what content is displayed; we watch. I have witnessed the invention and creation of this new technology and I warned my own children about getting sucked into the screen. Then I got a cell phone and a Kindle, and a high-speed computer and I relished the convenience of having so much information at my disposal. Ivan Illich, way back in 1971, warned about the coming “information overload” and the danger it posed to our ability to “pay attention.” The problem, of course, is that we have created a society that is now dependent upon “getting attention”. Businesses and people invest vast amounts of energy creating a “brand” that they can use to make money. There is nothing unusual about this idea. The free market system, we are told, is designed to permit competition to create better products and services. If I make a product that’s better at a lower price, everyone benefits. But what happens when the products don’t get better, just the advertising? What happens when the high-speed information highway is cluttered with people simply trying to get attention? And willing to do almost anything to get that attention? After watching the events in Washington over the last two weeks, it is obvious we need to examine how our information systems have been corrupted by irresponsible and unethical users. In the meantime, I am going to carefully monitor my viewing habits to avoid those sources – whether online or wireless - that offer little entertainment or enlightenment. I have intentionally avoided naming specific programs because I know tastes and temperament vary. I will say that most of my favorite on air programing comes from PBS. And I am a huge movie fan, so the DVD gets lots of use.   Whatever you watch, I hope it provides enlightenment or creative distraction. We need both today.

Revisit the Theatre.

As a Theatre teacher I used to ask my students to image making a movie about their experiences from the day before. We’d have a humorous discussion about the various things they might include. Eventually I would ask them, “How many people do you think will want to watch your movie?” This generated the usual funny responses, but ultimately most concluded that their films would be boring, and no one would want to watch. “Why boring?” I’d ask. They’d say, “Nothing happens!” And we would begin the conversation about why conflict is so important in storytelling. We are fascinated by the way people overcome the conflicts in their lives, and the stories we tell help us better understand the nature of the “core” conflicts we all face. There is no better place to watch human beings struggle with conflict than in the theatre. There are few places where, behind the “aesthetic distance” of a play, an audience member can safely watch a dramatic character’s life unfold before them. Those of us who can recall moments in the theatre when we wept or shuddered at the suffering we saw onstage can attest to its power. Most of all, we get to see the nobility - and sometimes the fragility- of those heroic characters who live before our eyes. I have written about my teenage self identifying with the struggle Tom Wingfield had in The Glass Menagerie and the moral dilemma Tevye faces in Fiddler, and I know many of you can recall similar feelings. Now is the time for us to let our best dramatists help us see and reflect upon the struggles we face. Don’t forget that these same dramatists can use those human conflicts to lift our spirits, too. There is nothing more exhilarating than sitting in an audience laughing uproariously. The pandemic has paused live theatre, but their virtual performances will do for now. My plan is to watch as much as I can and find comfort in the noble people created on stage.

This is a critical time in America. Our only hope for the future is for decent, honest, and determined people to reaffirm their commitment to the basic values and principles we aspire to. Help each other. Don’t lie. Don’t cheat. Don’t cover up for those who do. Admit when you’re wrong. Be humble. Maybe the best way to end is an excerpt from Robert Fulghum’s famous Credo:

ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate-school mountain, but there in the sandpile at Sunday School. These are the things I learned:
Share everything.
Play fair.
Don’t hit people.
Put things back where you found them.
Clean up your own mess.
Don’t take things that aren’t yours.
Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody.
Wash your hands before you eat.
Flush.
Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
Live a balanced life—learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
Take a nap every afternoon.
When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together.
Wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup—they all die. So do we.
And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned—the biggest word of all—LOOK.
Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.
Take any one of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your family life or your work or your government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm. Think what a better world it would be if we all—the whole world—had cookies and milk about three o’clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had as a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.
And it is still true, no matter how old you are—when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.