Impossible
Steve Martin said once that it was impossible to put a Cadillac up your nose.
There are impossibilities.
You can't build a stairway to the moon.
There is no way to stop time.
I will never be an Olympic athlete.
Impossibilities are limits.
Limits define the extent of expectations.
Humanity has and continues to impose limits on itself.
What it believes to be impossible.
We can't provide housing for free.
We can't educate those people.
We can't feed you unless you work for it.
We can't provide for your safety because that would limit our access to guns.
The Constitution can't be changed.
You are not equal to me.
Those people are lazy.
I'm a winner, you're a loser.
A good portion of humanity believes that the world is set in stone.
Or it should be.
Belief in the power of the impossible means shelter from reality for too many of us.
If equal rights are impossible, why even try?
If the 2nd Amendment can't be changed, just shut up and bury the dead.
If a President won't sign a bill, why would we want to talk about that?
Belief in the impossible allows the shallow-minded evil of low expectations and high personal interest to hide behind a straw man.
It is the foundation of nihilism.
Nihilism rejects the value of your life and mine.
It is the Bible from which the sociopath preaches.
Incidentally, that's a bit of irony because the nihilist rejects all religious and moral principles.
From its conception, the idea of nihilism was created as an intellectual canard.
It is a dull instrument used to smash the ties that bind humanity together.
Like a plow forced into the solid ground of society, it turns over the soil of compassion and destroys trust.
Nihilism is the acid that is thrown onto hope.
Nihilism is the friend of the tyrant.
That tyrant is only limited by their access to power.
Not all of us know a dictator personally, but we do have a relative or friend who believes it's impossible to make change.
Isn't there always someone who says that's impossible, why would you bother, don't waste your time, you can't do that?
Why do these people in our lives want to set a limit on the possible?
Who are they?
What is it they want?
They want you and me to live in fear.
They are your brother and sister, your friend, your parent, your relative, your pastor, priest, Rabi, police, congressman, senator, and President.
Fear is used by tyrants to manage expectations.
Fear is used to keep the possible from happening.
There are a lot of people selling fear these days, aren't there?
There are a lot of people throwing a rope around expectations and trying to pull it back in.
Trying to keep things from changing.
They can feel the world tipping up onto its side and all the pieces on the chessboard of life falling out of place.
They like order their order.
They don't want to share a lunch counter with a person with brown skin.
They don't want to buy a cake from a Gay baker.
They don't want strangers coming to their country.
They don't want you to have a home and a hot meal.
Their god told them that the world was only for them and not for all of us.
We're upsetting the apple cart.
We need to sit down because we're rocking the boat of their expectations.
Some of these people are so angry that they will kill us because we believe in the possible.
Their belief in fear is that deep.
Their oneness with hate knows no limit.
Can the ocean keep from rushing to the shore?
It's just impossible.
Can you stop justice from exposing the evil plots of mankind?
It's just impossible.
Can you stop the Brotherhood of Man from filling our hearts with hope? It's just impossible.
That sentiment you hear in our country echoes down that street where a guy is being beaten.
That sound you hear is when voices shout for the re-establishment of our democracy.
That sound you hear is the feet marching for our human right to exist free from fear.
We are the ones to take up the challenge to make the impossible possible.
Don't say no, say yes, I can.
Do right.
Peace
Daniel J Frey aka Toby