Fern Ridge Review
Creswell Chronicle
Sweet Lorane Community News
November 10, 2016
By Pat Edwards
As I write this, the “elephant in the room” has everyone talking… it’s certainly not being ignored. Like so many others, I don’t know what to think about the results of the Presidential election, but it came to me that I needed to release some of the thoughts I’ve had since then. I’m not a political person and I’m tired of all of the political rhetoric, but I’d like to share these words with you that I wrote today, Thursday, November 10:
God can be many things to different people… Lord, the Almighty, the Creator, the Maker, the Godhead, Allah, Jehovah, Yahweh; the Father, the Holy Ghost/Spirit, the Holy Trinity; the Great Spirit, Gitchi Manitou. Some who call themselves atheists have a kind of god, too… in the form of human intellect.
The President of the United States is not a god. No matter what your faith, color or other “label,” we must believe that our god, with the help of people who are willing to serve our country, can guide us towards a more unified nation. The strength of our country is in the people who work to make it the best that it can be.
Let’s do away with these labels that divide us. Each of us have at least one. My most recent, seemingly trendy, label since the election, is “uneducated white” which appears to be taken by some as a derogatory term equivalent to “illiterate.” I don’t have any big degrees after my name, yet I feel that I am educated. My life’s experiences and accomplishments have given me the best degree I could ever want. SOME of the “educated” (another label) – those who have completed college and have big initials after their names – seem to have set up an elite class that considers the “uneducated” as lesser than themselves.
What would our country be without the blue collar workers (there… see? I need to quit using labels, too) who manufacture our goods, raise our food, repair our cars, build our homes, pump our gas, clerk in our stores and run small businesses throughout our country? Why is it that farmers can no longer easily get help to pick their crops or stack their hay from local teenagers? Too many of them are told that, “No… you can do better than that.” It’s true, they can… eventually; but if our kids don’t start at the bottom and learn the importance of how things are produced and what physical labor is, they lose touch with the essence that truly drives our nation. If everyone was an executive or administrator, we would be lost because there would be no one to do the actual work. Education is very important, certainly, but it doesn’t always need to be a formal college education.
White, Black, Native American, Christian, Latino, Muslim, Male, Female, Jewish, LGBT, Educated, Uneducated, Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Liberal, etc., etc., etc. are all labels. Those of us who call this nation our home only need one label… we are all Americans.
We need to join together and quit putting each other and ourselves in little boxes. Let’s work as equals to resolve the differences that divide us. “God bless America, Land that I love; Stand beside her and guide her through the night from the light from above…” (~ Irving Berlin)
All Things Lorane 