Even in the midst of unrest we are reminded of how great this country is...and can be //
America is burning…again.
We go through this at least once a decade. Not to diminish the very real pain behind the protests and violence. I certainly do not intend to make light of that. In fact, that is the one thing I find so encouraging about all this right now. America regularly explodes into tense confrontation because Americans are not finished trying. We’re not finished trying to be better. We’re not finished trying to fix things…to fix ourselves. We’re not finished fighting to be the best nation possible for all of our citizens.
We will never be finished. That is the very essence of the American spirit. //
. One is focused on the future and one is focused on the present. One includes destruction and one includes exploration. One is happy and hopeful, one is painful and discouraging. Yet both exist as a beautiful testament to the American Dream.
I can hear some of you already.
Hang on there, Kira! What we’re seeing on the streets of Minneapolis is no dream. It’s a nightmare!
Yes, but that is and has always been where dreams are born…struggle. That is literally the history of this nation for better or for worse. Everything good that we have, every victory we have won for ourselves and for other nations, every improvement we’ve made to our own society has come from immensely painful and often violent struggle. We’ve never been satisfied to say, “We’ve done it. This is good enough and it’s as good as it can get.” //
Anarchists aside, there is a lot of genuine rage and anger being represented in these protests and it feels hopeless right now. But we’ve been through this before. These are cleansing fires, not wildfires. When the smoke and ash clears we will pick up the pieces of our neighborhoods and business and fragile relationships and move forward better than ever, more aware than ever – just like we did after the L.A. riots, just like we did after Ferguson, just like we did after the tumultuous protests of the sixties. America did not stop in any of those places. We got better.
