Quick, what are two of our biggest "gaps" in America? The generation gap and the nationality gap. But after living 40 years in Park Ridge, I find happy little bridges across those gaps. I hope this is true of other communities as well.
Take this thing about the generations. Sometime the older we get, the more we forget what it's like to be young. To be adolescent. To be carefree even if sometimes a little careless. But if you need a pick-me-up as to the budding merits of the young, drop the drone of news reports about teen drugs, pregnancy and gangs for just an instructive moment. Instead, visit some of our Park Ridge eateries which are staffed by teens. Dairy Queen...Pickwick Restaurant...Otherwise...Panera...and my family's personal favorite, South Park's dainty Colonial Coffee Shop. In all these years, I can't remember ever encountering any young servers whose smile and service didn't renew my faith in the future!
Sure kids are troubled and troublesome -- especially the ones who reach the metro editions because they make the hottest headlines; but I've spent a career with them in high school classrooms, and by my math, for every hoodlum there's at least 10 heroes. There's so much good stuff brewing just beneath the grungy surface. In time -- why they might even grow up into responsible adults just like wonderful us!
As for the nationality gap which always means the specter of immigration, lets face it -- all our families were immigrants. But right here in town we share this community with a couple dozen nationalities which are on successful daily display. In our many ethnic restaurants...shoe repair shops...cleaners..and my pwn personal favorites, our two Italian barbershops. Mario's -- Touhy & Northwest Highway -- is something like a little Rome. Really! Every barber there is Italian...each from a different colorful region of the country....bringing with them their own unique skill, courtesy and charisma...plus the flags of our nation's armed services proudly festooning the place. Every haircut here is a free 30-minute tour of our two nation's best!
No, we're not the most diverse community in the Midwest...but we do house some of the happiest diversity you'll find this side of the UN Building. Come to think of it, we're probably doing an even better job than they are...!
OH NO, ANOTHER VAST RIGHT-WING CONSPIRACY
Well, wouldn't you know it -- another "vast right-wing conspiracy....!"
This one may be a family affair. First there's the hot-headed US Representative from Carolina, Joe Wilson. But his mouth is perhaps bigger than his influence. However, now there's another Wilson -- Bill -- whose got lots of money, lots of anger, and therefore whose anti-administration influence is a lot greater. (He just made the front page of the New York Times).
I don't know whether these two passionate Wilson's are related by blood, but they are by baggage. They are among that slice of a democratic population that always seems to take their right to free speech to prodigious heights. They are those among us who always feel they are standing taller and smarter than most in the way they can see what is evil in our midst. And -- by God and the First Amendment! -- they intend to roar their mind.
Who can tell the difference between a bitter dissenter and a perceptive prophet...? I can't. And yet neither can their followers. History as usual will write the final chapter. But in the meantime -- while they heap every evil and evil motive onto this administration -- it will be the enduring responsibility of the rest of us to listen carefully to both sides. And to take the time between football parties and other sprightly diversions to honestly discern the facts from the fictions, the right from the rage, and the different dreams we are each dreaming in this too-complicated-for-sloganeering new age.
Gee, where's that wise Philosopher-King when you need one....?
I like your "positive" take on the youth of America as I have become a bit jaded. Even as I read your article, I was thinking, they are getting "paid" to be polite. I wonder what would happen if you bumped into one of them in the mall with all their friends. But you do pose a different look at things that I guess I should consider in my old age!
ReplyDeleteAs far as a "Right Wing Conspiracy" I think that it's safe to say that 90% of the Republicans are so anti Obama it's not even funny. I'm no political genius, but even I can see that if he fails, we ALL fail! What is wrong with the Wilsons, Palins, Limbaughs etc. of the world? And like you said...where is the Philospher King?
ReplyDeleteAnonymous -- right, there really are some good things going on with the young. Not all of them, but then neither is it with we adults either. In the long run, most of them will turn out just as good as we did...if not better.
ReplyDeleteAs for the Obama critics, they seem to have decided that he is evil incarnate and thus everything he does must somehow be evil as well. Hardly an authentic argument, but somehow it makes their darker demons feel like they have now found a new purpose in life!