ON THE ROAD AGAIN

And so another new beginning to our lives. The beginning of the second half of 2009. What waits for us up ahead? As members of our family, as citizens of our nation, as members of the world community....?

The distance between our mornings and those mountains of achievement we dream about may be longer than we'd like. Or perhaps shorter than we think. Either way, there's really only two ways to travel them....

....either we get through them, or we go through them!

Subtle but stunning distinction here. Getting through is the conventional slugging your way down the crooked miles; going through means a large lusty squeeze of every piece of every day. Now who among us can really do that? Well, saints and poets maybe. But the rest of us -- from president to pawnbroker -- can at least try.

Consider the daily sights, sounds, smells and stars that loom just up ahead.

The sight of another crimson dawn seeping across the green of our world...the landscape of morning joggers and delivery-truck drivers....the vision of beautiful women with long hair snapping in the breeze....the portrait of brief-cased ambitions stepping briskly into commuter trains....the broad-shoulders of bulky men sweating as they go about the job of keeping a city alive....the skyline of soaring buildings stretching their glass and concrete as if trying to reach heaven.

Also the everyday sounds out there. Too rich and resonant to simply get through, you have to go through them. Honestly, who's too busy -- president or pawnbroker -- to pause at least a moment over the rhapsodies of the starlings and sparrows...the credenzas of the breezes strumming the trees...the buzz of lawnmowers manicuring our plots of the earth....the roar of jets sending and bringing back aisles of big deals and even bigger dreams....and, not to be forgotten, the sounds of puppies yapping and kids yelping at the break of another succulent summer day.

And oh the smells. Fragrances, really, if you take the time. The bouquet of fresh-brewed coffee...the perfume of fresh-mowed lawns...the tang of blooming gladiolas and peonies....say and what about the exhaust fumes of fat shipping trucks and clanging garbage haulers, for even the sounds of dissonance help make the symphony all the richer and more complex.

Now as for the stars -- well, there are more than the ones which wink during the night. This next half of 2009 has a storehouse of less tangible stars waiting for us. If only we take the time to feel their light. Just getting through another six months won't do. It won't do at all! Each of us -- presidents to pawnbrokers -- can't fully function without the magnets of a few future new possibilities in our lives. Maybe a new career, a new child, a new home, a new contract, a new law, some new victory little or large that shines there just beyond our usual reach.

Sure, we can get through our life without stars. But to really go through our life demands constellations of hopes and dreams that make the trip worth the time. And this half of the year seems as good a time as any.