Category: Courage

Being There

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

a-heart-made-of-stone-from-god-to-remind-us-of-his-love-brigette-hollenbeckImagine being an American of Japanese decent immediately after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. It had to have been a very frightening time for everyone, but the overreaction to the incident resulted in fear of anyone who was Japanese even if they were born here and had lived in our country for decades. The United States government answered the attack by rounding up these citizens and placing them in detention camps, one of the more unfortunate missteps in our country’s history. Among them was a little girl who lived in Los Angeles. She was in the first grade at the time and her best friend was Mary Frances. Immediately after Pearl Harbor the little girl became a pariah through no fault of her own. Only Mary Frances continued to be her ally and to protect her from the taunts that rained down on her head. Eventually the child and her family were sent to Wyoming where they lived behind a chain link fence fortified with barbed wire. Their conditions were cramped and frightening, and the little one did not understand what was happening, but she would always remember how Mary Frances had stood up for her. She loved Mary Frances and never ever forgot her.

A lifetime of years passed. The little girl became a woman. She studied to be a nurse and worked all over the world. She had a very good and productive life, but more than anything she wanted to find Mary Frances to thank her for her unfaltering friendship. She had no idea how to even begin, but with the help of professionals she tracked Mary Frances down. They planned to meet in the Japanese Gardens in San Francisco. There the once tiny child who was now an old woman rejoiced upon seeing her old pal. She was finally able to describe how important Mary Frances had been to her at that crucial time.

As I heard this story I thought of the people who have passed through my life who were exactly where I needed them to be at important junctures in my development. Most of them were there and then they were gone forever. I never really had an opportunity to tell them how much they actually meant to me, and I so wish that I might one day see them again.

My first recollection is of a woman named Pat Wright. She was our next door neighbor when I was no more than four or five years old. She was a striking woman with a flair for the spectacular. She might have played the role of “Auntie Mame.” She was a commercial artist and her home reflected her avant guard take on life. She often invited me to visit with her and in those times she and I created art work together. She told me how talented I was and made me feel as though I was the most special person on earth. Nobody other than family members had ever before been so attentive to me and I loved her dearly. We moved when I was six and my parents made promises to get together for visits, but somehow that never happened, and so I never again saw Pat Wright. I have thought of her over and over again and smiled at the memory of being in her extraordinary home and drawing with her professional tools. I suppose that if she were even alive she would be well into her nineties. I would so enjoy being able to tell her how much I enjoyed our time together, but I suppose that will never really happen.

When I was five years old my parents enrolled me in the first grade with no warning. One day they simply announced that I would be going to school the following morning. I was terrified, but unwilling to reveal my fear with tears. I needn’t have been so worried because I was soon to meet two angels who have forever been in my heart. The first was my teacher, Sister Camilla, who in so many ways inspired me to become a teacher and influenced my teaching style. She was gentle and loving and helped me to feel welcomed and secure. I also met a girl named Virginia who seemed to sense just how upset and worried I was. She guided me through the ropes of being a student as well as a youngster is capable of doing. She gave me wise advice and encouraged me. I adored her as much as I did Sister Camilla. Between the two of them school became a happy place for me. I had thought that Virginia and I would surely be best friends forever, but that was not to be. My family moved to a new neighborhood and soon I was in another school.

I imagined that I would never again see either Sister Camilla or Virginia, but as with Pat Wright I carried the warm memories of being with them in my memory. Consider my surprise when I learned at my fiftieth high school reunion that a number of my classmates had been in that same classroom when I was, and among them was Virginia. I have learned that Virginia is today as sweet and wonderful as she was back then, and I hope that she doesn’t think it too strange when I tell her what a profound impact she had on me.

There have been others like Rose Marie Frey, a neighbor who was perhaps the most beautiful woman that I have ever known. She had five children of her own but somehow she always found time to talk with me and make me feel very grown up. She taught me how to do so many things that I might otherwise never have known about. I was quite sad when she and her family left our neighborhood. We went to visit them many times but as so often happens we soon lost touch. I truly hope that she has had a very good life.

Perhaps Edith Barry wins the grand prize for being there when I most needed someone. She and my mother were the best of friends and had shared many secrets with one another. One of the things that my mom had confessed to Edith was her fear of being diagnosed as mentally ill like her mother had been. She asked Edith to promise that she would be a protector if anyone ever even suggested that Mama needed medical care for such an illness. Of course how could Edith have known that my mother would have a terrible nervous breakdown requiring hospitalization? When virtually every adult abandoned me as I struggled to get my mom the care that she so desperately needed it was only Edith who was willing to incur Mama’s wrath and be a true and loving friend by insisting that she admit herself for care. By helping me Edith did in fact lose my mother. Their friendship suffered, but I understood all too well that Edith had made the ultimate loving sacrifice and she would become my all time hero. I don’t suppose that I really ever explained to her how much I appreciated what she had done. Now she is gone and I can only hope that somehow she knew.

We each have those special people. They do remarkable things for us that we almost take for granted at the time, but in retrospect we realize how wonderful they actually were. We would do well not to wait too long to let them know how important they have been. 

A Time To Remember

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

prodigal_sonI grew up in Catholic schools and we were not exactly Biblical scholars. I understood the gist of the stories and parables in that great book, but I would be lost if I had to name the chapters and verses that contain various elements. Still I have enough familiarity with the four books that comprise the volume that I am able to relate both the history in the Old Testament and the story of Jesus in the New. What I learned is that Jesus was all about love and redemption. Over and over again he pushed back against the rule oriented Pharisees and preached the importance of understanding that He had come to remind us all that God is open to each and every one of us and that it is never too late to ask for forgiveness.

Jesus was often misunderstood by the people of His time which ultimately resulted in His being hung from a cross like a common criminal. So it is little wonder that even people who profess to be experts in the interpretation of His words might come up with ideas that appear to be more in line with the Pharisees than with Jesus. Somehow we can all hear or read the very same passages and come up with differing interpretations of them. It’s been happening for centuries and no doubt will continue as long as we humans attempt to unravel the instructions of how best to use Jesus’ instructions for how to behave toward one another.

One of my favorite parables was that of the Prodigal Son. Jesus told this story after the Pharisees and other critics suggested that He was often sinful in the selection of people with whom He associated. They disliked that Jesus was friends with tax collectors and women of dubious character and such. They worried about how He flaunted the religious laws by performing miracles on the Sabbath. They felt that Jesus too often excused bad behavior when He should have instead condemned it. What they didn’t appear to understand is that Jesus was preaching a new way of living that promised every human a pathway to amnesty regardless of how egregious their sins might once have been. Somehow large numbers of people who purport to be loving Christians have forgotten this message and instead use fire and brimstone passages from the Old Testament to defend their unforgiving stances on various issues.

The whole idea of illegal immigration, and in particular the Dreamers is a perfect example of how very religious people have somehow become unwilling to even consider the idea of forgiving those who broke the law or those who were brought to our country without consent when they were children. We have forgotten the story of the the Prodigal Son, perhaps the most powerful tale that Jesus ever related. In it he spoke of a very wealthy man who had two sons, one of whom became impatient to receive his inheritance and asked his father to give it to him immediately. The errant son took his father’s treasure and went away with it, forgetting about his family and living a profligate life. After losing everything he was starving and desperate. He came back home with the intention of begging his father to take him back as a servant to earn his keep. Instead when the loving father saw his son returning he rushed out to meet him, instructing the servants to clothe his child in fine robes. He not only forgave his son but planned a celebratory meal for him. When the other son who had been faithful to his father heard what was happening he was irate, questioning why his brother should be honored when he had been so thoughtless. The father reminded the angry son that a parent’s love is unconditional and that by prostrating himself the prodigal son had demonstrated his willingness to change and seek forgiveness.

I think of this parable whenever the subject of illegal immigration is mentioned. I realize that we cannot as a nation continue to allow people to break the law without consequence, but there are people here who came for very good reasons which we may or may not understand. They have lived peacefully among us, working hard and doing their best to fit into our society. Since we did little to turn them back initially they have little hope of returning to their native countries and finding a livelihood because they have been gone for too long. The truth is that we sat back for decades and did nothing to stop them. Now many among us want to simply turn their backs on these people and send banish them without any thought to what doing so may mean. There are even some who wish to punish their children who were brought when they were too young to even understand what was happening. Like the Pharisees so many Americans and lawmakers only see the rules and not the humanity of the situation. They shout down any plan that might rectify the status of these individuals without giving them actual citizenship, but requiring them to come out of the shadows. They speak of amnesty as if it is a dirty word rather than one that Jesus Himself would no doubt have appreciated given His propensity for forgiving people thought to be hopelessly broken. 

I tend to believe that our political leaders who continually oppose all immigration plans that propose even a smattering of forgiveness are mostly concerned about losing political power. They don’t seem to realize that their unwillingness to bend and compromise even a bit is only exacerbating the problem. They spread silly ideas that they should not concern themselves with the fate of immigrants rather than the safety of Americans. They point to the lawlessness of those who would cross our borders without permission and insinuate that most who come here are criminals. They raise the fears of our citizens by suggesting that terrorists will be coming if we do not have a hard line. Instead of telling us what chain immigration is and why we have it, they just make us afraid of it. They point to criminals who came here through chain immigration as though such incidents are the norm. They constantly speak of rules that must never be broken, forgetting how often Jesus did just that to emphasize our need to be compassionate and loving. They conveniently forget the ultimate message of redemption by His death on the cross.

As I write this the government shut down for a short time because our leaders were at an impasse. A few days later they grudgingly agreed to a short term fix, but left all of the big problems for another day. Who knows how well those discussions are going to go given the fact that we haven’t had many bipartisan moments in years. We appear to no longer be able to compromise. I suspect that if our Founding Fathers had been this way we might all still be part of the British Empire like Canadians. They would have argued infinitely and gotten nowhere, which is where we are now. 

There are those who want to lay blame for the state of our union and I would like to suggest that there is plenty to go around to everyone including those of us who vote. Of late we have turned our backs on anyone who has shown the desire to bring the country together for the general good. While we are bickering real people are being hurt and we are forgetting about all of those beautiful parables that Jesus taught us, and yet Jesus Himself would be loving and understanding even of those of us who have sometimes forgotten or ignored His message. Maybe the time has come to remember it the way it was intended to be.

The Face That We Must See

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

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Two hundred thousand is a number, twenty percent of a million. It’s an amount that is difficult to imagine, a little less than half the number of people who fit into Kyle Field, the stadium at Texas A&M University. If dollar bills representing this amount were stacked one on top of another they would be around ninety thousand feet high, forty five times higher than the largest building in the world. In other words the more we think about it, the more we realize that two hundred thousand is a very large number, and yet it still doesn’t quite register when a headline announces that two hundred thousand immigrants from El Salvador are quite suddenly in danger of losing the protection which has allowed them to live legally in the United States since the early nineteen nineties. A number does not really tell a story or reveal a human face, and yet with a flick of the pen an entire group of people has been lumped together in a move that does not take their individual struggles and successes into account.

Back in 1991, President George H.W. Bush gave citizens of El Salvador who were living in the United States temporary protective status after a devastating earthquake hit their native country. Every eighteen months the immigrants were required to pay hundreds of dollars in fees to maintain their work authorization. Most of them gladly performed the the required registrations rather than facing the growing violence and poverty in their home country. In the process the vast majority have become thoroughly integrated into the communities in which they live. They have held down jobs, purchased homes and raised families. They have been Americanized in almost every since other than becoming citizens and earning the right to vote. For the most part they began to take their status for granted as Presidents Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama continued their protective status, particularly in the face of the rise of dangerous gangs in El Salvador like MS13. The people thought that they would be safe here, and they built their lives around that belief. Now the Trump administration has suddenly announced that they will no longer enjoy protected status, throwing into question what will eventually happen to them unless Congress somehow provides them with a reprieve via immigration reform.

Most people don’t pay much attention to such actions because they do not affect them in any personal way, but I happen to know a lovely family whose lives have already been touched  by this decision, and I am both fearful and heartbroken that they must endure the uncertainty that lies ahead. They are literally at the mercy of lawmakers who have no idea just how wonderful they actually are, and I worry that it will be more important to members of Congress to take a hard line to impress voters than to do the right thing. Friends of mine are in trouble and few people in the United States even care or want to know about them. It is a situation that makes me immeasurably sad, not just for this wonderful family but for the character of our country which has grown so seemingly cold hearted.

I learned of these Salvadorans when their daughter attended the high school where I was working. She was the eldest in her family, a young woman determined to take full advantage of the sacrifices that her parents had made to insure that she would have a good life. They had left their homeland behind in the hopes of protecting their child from the horrors that were unfolding there. They found solace in Houston, Texas and began working hard to prove themselves and to be role models for their children. They were quite successful in their quest to be the kind of people that we all hope to be. They attended church regularly and inculcated a strong value system in their children. They emphasized the need for education and encouraged their young ones to work hard. They paid their bills and saved their money and eventually became owners of a lovely home where their extended family lived together in great harmony.

Their daughter, who was one of my students and has over time become a dear friend, lived every single day with determination and gratitude. She earned a high school diploma with honors, demonstrating extraordinary leadership skills. She was selected to attend a youth conference in Washington D.C. where she shone so brightly that she was interviewed by NPR. She spoke with the grace and wisdom of the maturity that her parents had helped her to achieve. She went on to attend the prestigious Bauer School of Business at the University of Houston where she continued to demonstrate her exceptional attitude and abilities. She headed student organizations and maintained exemplary grades, eventually being highlighted as one of the premier students at the school. All the while her parents reregistered every eighteen months and did all that was asked of them. They were good people who more than deserved the protection that the government gave them. They and their children contributed to the welfare of our city, our state and our nation in extraordinary ways, and they were proud of their accomplishments.

This past December the young lady graduated from the University of Houston with honors. I was there to watch her walk across the stage and I rejoiced with her and her parents. I attended a gala at her home to celebrate her accomplishment with her many friends. Her boyfriend surprised her with a proposal of marriage on that evening, and it seemed as though all of the hopes and dreams that the family ever had were coming true. It was the happiest of times for all of us until news of the suspension of their protective status was announced. Now for the first time they are very afraid of what will happen to them. They wonder if all of their hard work will only lead them back to a place from which they fled. They worry that they will somehow be split apart. The situation has become an uncertain nightmare for them, and I find myself feeling so helpless. I want to do something for them, but have no idea what that might be. I feel their pain intensely and I grow more and more angry that they must endure this at all.

They are but a few of those two hundred thousand people who never thought that they would one day find themselves in such a situation of uncertainty. They are our students, our neighbors, members of our churches, hardworking employees, people about whom we truly care, and we want everyone else to really know them as we do. It is only when they become flesh and blood and real that it is so apparent that we cannot let them down. We must help them to stay in the place that is now most truly their home. We must ease their concerns and embrace them as the incredible people that they are. To do less is a travesty of the highest order.

I honestly don’t know what will happen. I cry at the though of somehow losing them. I pray with a sense of desperation that our lawmakers will find a sense of decency and fairness in their hearts and save them. My voice is so small, but I want to shout loudly from atop that ninety thousand foot platform of dollar bills that represents people like them. I want all of the world to understand the importance of demonstrating our collective compassion by reaching out to them in kindness. I want the uncaring attitudes that have made them so insecure to evaporate. I want all of us to think about who we are as people and to remember how many of us came from ancestors not so different from the members of this family and the other thousands who truly believed that they had found comfort in our midst. I want them to feel welcomed once again. I want their status to allow them to be one of us. I want everyone to see the face that we all must see.

Unrest

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

omar-jen-wheelchair-woodsShe is incredibly bright and beautiful, a graduate of Harvard who was about to complete her doctorate at Princeton. She was in love with a brilliant man and the two of them travelled the world together. They made plans to marry, have a family, build their stunning careers together, and then she caught the flu. It was a particularly harsh case with fevers of one hundred four degrees. When she was well once again she felt debilitated, but thought little of the residual effects. She had after all been very ill. She told herself that it would simply take time to regain her energy, but something was very wrong because instead of growing stronger she began to feel more and more weak. There were even times when her mind did not seem to work properly. She was unable to find the proper words to express herself. It was all so frightening.

Eventually her symptoms became so concerning that she sought the expertise of a medical doctor. He insinuated that it was all in her head, diagnosing her with what used to be known as hysteria. He suggested that she was reacting to some deep seated trauma that she most likely was unable to remember. He sent her home with no real explanation for what was happening, and she began to wonder if she was indeed going crazy. That’s when she got an idea.

The next time her symptoms became so severe that she literally collapsed in pain, unable to move or express herself, she asked her husband to film the incident. She took the video to a neurologist who was stunned by what he saw. He eventually told her that she had ME. Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, a strange disease that is thought to afflict ten to fifteen million people worldwide. There is no definitive test for the illness and no cure. The diagnosis is made based on symptoms alone which include excessive fatigue after mental or physical activity, intolerance to exercise, joint and/or muscle pain, memory problems, difficulty walking, sore throats, headaches, flu-like symptoms, sleep disturbance, bowel problems and mood swings.

The disease is also known as chronic fatigue syndrome and affects those who have it along a spectrum from individuals who endure a mild attack and then recover fully, to those who become completely homebound and bed ridden. There is no known cause but the disease appears to follow otherwise fairly typical and minor illnesses like the flu. Some believe that the roots of the problems lie in hormonal or allergy issues, but none of the research has proven any of the theories. It is a greatly misunderstood disease that sometimes results in psychiatric diagnoses rather than physical ones.

The woman whose life was so impacted by ME is Jennifer Brea, and she has a debilitating case of the disease that has radically altered the trajectory of her life. In a fashion keeping with her personality she decided to film her journey along with that of four other victims so that she might shed light on a mostly misunderstood illness. In conjunction with Sundance Films she created the documentary. Unrest, that chronicles her experiences as well those of the four others whose lives have been so radically changed after contracting ME. The film debuted on the PBS program Independent Lens this January and its power to visually explain what happens to those who have ME is emotionally visceral.

Jennifer Brea holds back nothing in her depiction of what ME has done to her and the relationship that she shares with her husband. She honestly expresses the fears and disappointments that plague her as much as the symptoms. She presents a compelling argument for more research by noting that those who are stricken often become like missing persons as they are forced to be hostages to their illness. She tells a compelling story of families broken apart and individuals losing their identities all while the rest of the world remains mostly ignorant of the horrors of this strange condition.

Her own story is one of the love that she and her husband share in spite of the problems that have so changed the way that they once thought they might live. She wants to be able to give him the kind of relationship that she had thought they would have, but instead is continually thwarted by recurrences of the most trying symptoms. Her husband has nobly stood by her, but even his patience is often tried by the confusing nature of his wife’s illness.

Ms. Brea shows a family in Sweden whose child was institutionalized in a psychiatric facility because doctors there were unwilling to accept a diagnosis of ME for her. Brea also introduces us to a woman who had been a happy wife and mother, one who had no idea that she would eventually be confined to bed with her own husband believing that she was just insane rather than physically ill. Her marriage deteriorated and she struggled to survive. When one of her daughters came down with the same disease her world unraveled even more.

The film is so personal, so real that those of us viewing the stories become involved with the characters, particularly Jennifer Brea herself. We watch her gaining strength and find ourselves hoping as much as she and her husband do that she will somehow miraculously improve. We cry with empathy as we become all too familiar with the struggles associated with ME.

Unrest is a touching and important documentary and quite worthy of the accolades that it has received. Hopefully it will also become the impetus for more research into the mysterious illness that it depicts with so much unflinching insight and compassion. At the present time very little is being done to learn how and why this illness affects certain people. There is only a smattering of interest in finding something that will cure those afflicted with its devastating symptoms. It is a grand mystery that shows no signs of being solved while real people suffer from the misunderstandings and lack of knowledge surrounding it. Hopefully Jennifer Brea has opened a door of awareness that will ultimately lead to the studies that will eradicate it or at least lead to more hopeful treatments. Perhaps just by spreading information about ME Unrest will at the very least bring more compassion to those who deal with its tragic effects.

Yesterday Today and Tomorrow

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

default-1464355425-834-scientists-believe-they-have-explained-the-great-flu-outbreak-of-1918A hundred years ago in the fall of 1918, there were many who seriously wondered if the world was coming to an end.  A great war was still raging in Europe and decimating the young male population. Across the globe there was unrest and a general feeling that life would never be quite the same again. The worst surprise of that autumn was to come in the form of a tiny virus not yet visible to the human eye with the microscopes of the day. It would lead to an outbreak of influenza that eventually killed as many as five million people worldwide and hundreds of thousands in the United States. One sneeze from an infected person had the potential to infect ten thousand, and for a time nobody knew what to do.

It appears to have begun at a military base in Kansas where it was first thought to be little more than the typical seasonal outbreak of illness. It soon became apparent that the new strain was unlike anything doctors and biologists had ever before seen. It started with coughing and a fever that quickly grew ever more severe. It filled the lungs of the ill with so much fluid that they literally drowned. Before long there were not enough beds or doctors for the affected, and not enough coffins for those who died. During the months of September and October of that year the disease spread like wildfire, sparking dire accusations that the Germans had somehow planted germs in the bodies of soldiers fighting in the trenches. The fact that German troops were just as susceptible to the sickness did not allay the fears of those who were losing loved ones and friends so rapidly that it felt as though there was nothing that was going to stop the rampage of death.

More American citizens died during those weeks than in all of the wars of the twentieth century, and yet there was no cure, no idea of what the cause might be. For some reason the virus was more likely to spare the very young and old, but was most deadly for strong and healthy adults in their twenties and thirties. It would be years later before researchers found the virus that had wreaked such havoc on the population, and began to understand that the sickness had burned itself out when those who survived became immune without any form of medical assistance. Our understanding of such diseases grew over time, but always there continues to be a silent fear that something similar may one day return to infect humanity like a plague.

I had never heard about the horrific influenza of 1918, until I read a book shared by my daughter. She is a nurse and science teacher who has a great deal of interest in such things, and she thought that I might find the topic interesting as well. I was stunned to learn about the horrific events and to realize that none of the older people I had known who would have been young adults during that period had ever mentioned the event. I was particularly surprised that my grandfather who was well known for his vivid stories of the past had not brought up the topic. Since I was unaware of that part of history I had not known to quiz him about what he remembered regarding that sad chapter, and so I was not privy to his eye witness account.

Historians conjecture that this particular episode must have been so personally horrific that those who had endured it did not want to speak of it again. Perhaps it was the impetus for the roaring liveliness of the twenties when people appeared to throw all caution to the wind. Living through such tragedy must have caused people to view the world much differently than they otherwise might have. Most certainly they would have wanted to blunt the memories that must have been quite horrific. When the next decade of frivolity was followed by a worldwide depression and eventually another war, the personal stories of illness and death might have seemed trivial to them by comparison. In truth, they would have been right to wonder if the bad news would ever stop, and when it finally did they most probably decided never to speak of it again.

My father-in-law served in Korea during the war there. He has only mentioned what he saw there once in all of the years that I have known him. His eyes filled with tears as he recounted his experience and his voice was shaky. It was much too painful a memory for him to think about for very long. I have noticed that my uncles who fought during World War II were just as reluctant to share stories of their adventures as were my peers who fought in Vietnam. I suppose that there are events that are so horrible that we prefer to bury the thoughts of them deep within our psyches. It is simply too much to dwell on them for very long. 

I suspect that those who were witness to the 1918 influenza epidemic simply did not want to speak of the unspeakable. They lost loved ones and friends in a matter of days and weeks. They worried that the horror might return at any moment. To dwell on their heartbreak and fears would have been unbearable and so they did not include mention of the outbreak in their tales of living. The story languished until curious souls began to ferret out the details and bring them to light once again. What is a curiosity for those of us removed by a hundred years was all too real for those who were there when it happened.

Each generation has its share of tragedy. For those of us who grew up just after World War II the events etched permanently inside our brains include the good, the bad and the ugly. We recall with clarity exactly where we were when John F. Kennedy was assassinated. It pains us to think of the deaths of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy that made is wonder if anarchy was going to rule the day. Many of have personal tragedies that affected us as well, the death of a father or hearing that a friend was killed in Vietnam. We smile when when we think of the first man to walk on the moon, and recoil at the vision of the twin towers in New York City falling like toy constructions before our eyes. These things affect us and change us and our ways of viewing the world, but we don’t often speak of them because the thoughts associated with them are too powerful and emotional. I suppose that the reality is that no matter how conversant we are there are no words sufficient to describe such things, and so we are silent just as my grandparents were about so much of the history that affected them.

Today we have new worries, but mostly go about our business hoping and praying that none of our biggest concerns will ever take place. Our natures compel us to be optimistic and to carry on even when situations seem dire. Like Scarlett O’Hara we believe that tomorrow will be a better day and we concentrate our thinking on the future rather than the past and the present. It’s how we survive. Still, there is something so fascinating about events like the influenza epidemic of 1918, that we can’t avert our gaze. We have to look if only for a moment so that we might remember that we are not immune to the same kinds of heartbreaking situations that plagued our ancestors. We are as human as they were, and we can only hope that when faced with tragedy we will respond well and not be judged too harshly for any mistakes that we make.

It’s all too easy to form opinions of what might have or should have happened. but we will never know what we might actually have done if we had faced similar hardships. It must have been a dark time, but somehow those who came before us found a way to keep moving forward without focusing too much on a past that they could not change. Perhaps we might learn from them and embrace each new day as an opportunity rather than dwelling on the heartache of the past. Yesterday is gone, today is an opportunity, and tomorrow allows us to repair any mistakes we have made. It’s the cycle that keeps the story of humanity alive.