I was born on December 12, 1952 -- which makes June 12 of each year my half-birthday. Uncle Jim was born on June 12, 1923, which meant that his half-birthday was on my birthday.
Because of how both New Year's Day and Independence Day happen during the first parts of January and July, one might think of New Year's Day as the birth of a brand new year and Independence Day (a.k.a. The Fourth Of July) as being the year's half-birthday.
Anyway, I've decided to share a couple of memes here along with my thoughts -- with the gist of those thoughts being that, while we aren't a perfect country, we're so great in so many ways.
We aren't where we might want to be right at the moment, but we've come a long way!!!
One thing that I would hate to see (I hate situations but never people) is for us to regress in ways that make us less than what we've become in the ways that matter.
For example, I would hate to see us go back to (naturally, as I'm a woman) those days when women weren't allowed to vote or to own property on their own. I believe that there will come a day in the near future when we'll have a woman serving as President Of The United States.
I remember watching the movie (something I'd done many times in the past, as it was one of my favorite movies to watch more than once) Guess Who's Coming To Dinner -- and (on this particular occasion) one part of it in particular made me cry tears of joy and grow goosebumps on my goosebumps.
It was the scene where John was discussing with his soon-to-be father-in-law how he and Joanna were going to deal with how their bi-racial kids would be seen and treated by the rest of the world.
He said that he and Joanna would raise those kids to feel so loved that it wouldn't matter -- and that one of them might even become President Of The United States someday.
I believe the movie (which had come out the same year that I graduated from eighth grade and entered high school: 1967 -- the last year when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Francis Kennedy would be around for the whole year and seven years before The World Trade Center would become part of the NYC skyline) was shown around Valentine's Day in 2009.
This was all part of dreams being realized, and I wondered about the people who had passed on and had those dreams of how things were on that day when a bi-racial man had just become POTUS44 a few weeks before!!!
The first one might have been REALLY astonished, as he, likely, didn't think that Negroes had the intellectual capacity to go that far but just wanted them to be treated with dignity -- the way that he treated his own slaves.
The others likely actually could see a person who was bi-racial or Black serving in The White House but, likely, would be amazed that, given all other factors, it would happen this soon.
They probably could also see a woman President being a reality sometime within the next 100 years. I wonder what John, Martin, and Bobby would think about how many different Presidential candidates are women this time around (here in 2019) and how not all of them are White.
The way I see it, we can't go back and right every wrong that has been done over the centuries -- we can only do better in the present and the future.
Or (though, hopefully, not) worse...
I believe these two words:BE KIND
should lead us in the decisions we make
and that these two words:
BE CRUEL
should be the description of what we DON'T want to be.
We should have grown enough to know the difference between the two -- and we should also choose love over hate and not let people get away with bullying others.
That's enough to digest for now...
Because of how both New Year's Day and Independence Day happen during the first parts of January and July, one might think of New Year's Day as the birth of a brand new year and Independence Day (a.k.a. The Fourth Of July) as being the year's half-birthday.
Anyway, I've decided to share a couple of memes here along with my thoughts -- with the gist of those thoughts being that, while we aren't a perfect country, we're so great in so many ways.
We aren't where we might want to be right at the moment, but we've come a long way!!!
One thing that I would hate to see (I hate situations but never people) is for us to regress in ways that make us less than what we've become in the ways that matter.
For example, I would hate to see us go back to (naturally, as I'm a woman) those days when women weren't allowed to vote or to own property on their own. I believe that there will come a day in the near future when we'll have a woman serving as President Of The United States.
I remember watching the movie (something I'd done many times in the past, as it was one of my favorite movies to watch more than once) Guess Who's Coming To Dinner -- and (on this particular occasion) one part of it in particular made me cry tears of joy and grow goosebumps on my goosebumps.
It was the scene where John was discussing with his soon-to-be father-in-law how he and Joanna were going to deal with how their bi-racial kids would be seen and treated by the rest of the world.
He said that he and Joanna would raise those kids to feel so loved that it wouldn't matter -- and that one of them might even become President Of The United States someday.
I believe the movie (which had come out the same year that I graduated from eighth grade and entered high school: 1967 -- the last year when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Francis Kennedy would be around for the whole year and seven years before The World Trade Center would become part of the NYC skyline) was shown around Valentine's Day in 2009.
This was all part of dreams being realized, and I wondered about the people who had passed on and had those dreams of how things were on that day when a bi-racial man had just become POTUS44 a few weeks before!!!
The first one might have been REALLY astonished, as he, likely, didn't think that Negroes had the intellectual capacity to go that far but just wanted them to be treated with dignity -- the way that he treated his own slaves.
The others likely actually could see a person who was bi-racial or Black serving in The White House but, likely, would be amazed that, given all other factors, it would happen this soon.
They probably could also see a woman President being a reality sometime within the next 100 years. I wonder what John, Martin, and Bobby would think about how many different Presidential candidates are women this time around (here in 2019) and how not all of them are White.
The way I see it, we can't go back and right every wrong that has been done over the centuries -- we can only do better in the present and the future.
Or (though, hopefully, not) worse...
I believe these two words:BE KIND
should lead us in the decisions we make
and that these two words:
BE CRUEL
should be the description of what we DON'T want to be.
We should have grown enough to know the difference between the two -- and we should also choose love over hate and not let people get away with bullying others.
That's enough to digest for now...
This land is not your land. #4thofJuly pic.twitter.com/zGBA5XtfBv— ᴰᴱᴵᴼᴺ (@prolevoron) July 4, 2019
