Picking up treasures in a shattered world
Scampering over rocks, they pause occasionally, picking up some treasure left by the waves. Their heads bend towards each other as they share, examine, exclaim.
I watch, as I so often do. The view before me is stunning: it is a sparkling autumn day and colors explode as waves crash and seafoam sprays the air, droplets catching little diamonds of light on their journey back to the churning ocean. But the sight of my two children together in a moment of pure wonder is the feast my eyes choose, especially today. I let it wash over me, as the tide washes over all the smooth little pebbles, gently soaking and softening them with each wave.
“I am so lucky.” This thought repeats in my mind, as it does frequently these days. I feel lucky to be a mother watching her children, in great health, explore and love the world, cradled by a feeling of safety.
In a week when bombs tore through buildings and bodies in Gaza and children fell by the thousands and when an armed, mentally ill man entered two businesses in a town in my state and killed 18, including at least one teenager, it is pure luck that I am not fearing for the lives of my children…or worse.
They do not know about my thoughts or the events of the week. They are seven and four. Their job, right now, is discovery: the way mussel shells crumble to a shining paste, the specific pop of certain types of seaweed when pressed, the skip of a flat stone across the water’s surface. Their pathway through discovery is sprinkled liberally with joy.
This is as it should be for seven and four. But, again, I find myself thinking, no, knowing: pure luck. Age is not a protective device in this world, no matter that it should be. After all, a great, everlasting crime is being committed against these children and all future generations: the robbing of a livable world by greed and fossil fuel tycoons.
Luck is a funny word. Right, in this case, insofar as it points to the fact that I do not believe that I, nor any of us, did something in particular to deserve a better situation than anyone else. But luck carries no hint of responsibility.
Privilege. Like many cultures, we use that word with our children when speaking about access to something that has responsibility associated with it. And responsibility is essential here. But, in certain contexts, privileges are spoken of as something earned, which brings me back to luck. I did nothing to earn the dumb luck of being a mother who sits here in the sun today, gazing at my children in a moment of deep peace while other mothers hold the bodies of their babies as “Why?” tears through their existence.
And here I go, digressing into philosophy, likely to avoid the grief tearing through my own body. Whatever the word, here’s the fact of the matter: nothing about this situation is fair and nothing about it is even remotely okay. The sun might be shining and the day might be golden, but lives are being shredded, both near and far, and, ultimately, it all comes down to greed. Greed and fear.
To the spineless U.S. senators, like my own “dear” Senator Susan Collins: there is blood on your hands. You choose power and money over doing what is right. Guns should be banned. The U.S. should stop funding colonization and genocide (which, incidentally, build a breeding ground for terrorism, in case you haven’t noticed). Climate change is real and requires immediate action. The list goes on. Stop playing with the lives of others like little chess pieces, each death a strategic move to maintain power. Stop deliberately misleading voters with fear when, deep down, we all hold much more in common than that which divides us. You know how powerful we’d be if we recognized that truth, and so you drive fear like a wedge between all that unites us.
To the fossil fuel tycoons and the major banks backing them: thanks to you, even within my position of tremendous privilege or luck or whatever you want to call it, each golden moment is followed by a tightening around my heart. I know what is coming, as much as any of us can right now. This peace is fragile, even temporary.
To my dear children: watch the gulls swoop and feel their freedom. Listen to the water trickle over the pebbles and delight in its music. Feel my arms enfold you and know you are loved. This world is beautiful, and it is terrible. Only the most vast love and wonder will carry us through.