Immune
Walking by a local restaurant, I see people enjoying their immunity.
Apparently, they are immune not only to the COVID-19 virus.
Our brothers and sisters are immune to society.
Immune to community.
Immune to compassion.
Immune to brotherhood.
Immune to love.
How did these people get their vaccine?
The answer is 'Blowing In The Wind', written by Bob Dylan.
He asked, how many roads must a man walk down before you call him a man?
How many years can some people exist before they are allowed to be free?
How many times can a man turn his head and pretend he just doesn't see?
The answer is that hate is reborn generation after generation.
By people, humans who believe they are doing good work.
Mothers and fathers.
Brothers and sisters.
Churches, schools, governments, police.
All keep the story of hate alive.
The Great White Myth.
I'm telling you here and now if you don't know this in your heart of hearts already.
This is a cold fact of life on this planet.
People have been making up stories to keep them from seeing reality since before recorded time.
Even before there were written languages, people told each other myths about the world.
They have told themselves these stories so many times that these tales are deeply ingrained in human psychology.
In The Hero's Journey by Joseph Campbell, "Myth is much more important and true than history."
Human's capacity to believe in their own myth is limitless.
They will believe in ghosts.
In Leprechauns.
In Golden Gods.
Their team will win a sports championship.
The 2nd Amendment can't be amended.
Tom Hanks eats babies.
White people are ordained by God to rule the earth.
Humans believe their own bullshit.
The only balance to myth is truth.
Yet truth is harsh, and myth is smooth.
Truth sticks in our throats.
Myth goes down like candy.
Truth goes against our expectations, and myth feeds our prejudices.
Some of us are lucky to be born able to see the beauty of the world.
While others have turned down that privilege and have focused their sight inward.
People who only help themselves are selfish.
They don't want to know about the cannonballs flying.
They don't want to see the man beaten down in the street.
They don't want to hear people cry.
Just as hate is seeded every generation, so too must love be grown in every generation.
Any gardener can tell you it's a continuous battle against the weeds.
We have to tend the garden of truth to keep out the weeds that would choke it out.
If you have hands, lift; if you have ears, listen; if you have a voice, speak up.
If you have a mind, love.
Peace.
Daniel J Frey aka Toby