stones in the road

Every generation has certain things in common.  In mine, we saw the assassination of the Kennedy brothers 5 years apart and the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. (there were other assassination/murders/deaths, it was also the age of serial killers and spree killers)
We saw TV coverage of the first, and hours of news coverage and re-creations; and people discussing all three.
We saw a presidential funeral--and maybe that somber sight made him more than his second term would have actually been, but it made us think he was a great president and a great hero.
The bigger world was the canvas that our lives were drawn on.
Our families, our communities, our schools and states created the culture that shaped us.  And those were both diverse and insular--so that we had different lives AND no idea, most of the time, that anyone lived differently than we did.
By Reagan, my generation was grown, had finished college, or not, had married, or not, had children, or not, BUT we all  just wanted to be rich.  We wanted to be like the people on Dynasty and Dallas.
The women wanted to wear designer clothes and have fancy jobs.
The men wanted a trophy wife and fast, high performance cars and a mansion.
We all quit protesting things we saw as wrong and started trying to climb; social climbing, business climbing, competing, networking, using each other to get to where we wanted to be.

And magically, all the injustice, all the hate, all the wrongs that we had wanted to right, disappeared from our sight and minds.
It was all about individual accomplishment and winning.  Nobody wanted to be a LOSER.
And the score card used at the end was the number of dollars and properties and times you made it on the front of a magazine read by the rich and famous.

We blamed the '60s on a big generation all young and idealistic at the same time.  Blamed--like what  happened was all bad; like fighting for peace and racial equality and womens rights and animal rights and ecology was a bad thing.
Sure, there were drugs and weird sex and weirder parties and music changed, but none of those were absent before, they just weren't seen or talked about.

When I was a child, all women were virgins until they married, then someone wrote a book called "fear of flying" and another wrote "The joy of sex" and all these middle aged mothers were admitting that might not have been absolutely true about the virginity stuff.

We had some sort of pendulum effect that occurred, and I'm not sure when.  It was while I was sleeping.  While I was raising 2 kids and working 2 jobs and juggling bills so that nothing was ever very far behind and if something went far behind, it wouldn't turn off the water or heat or get the car repossessed.

We became again a nation of  allegiance pledging and now we had helicopter parents whose children never had need of a bandaid, but wore them like tattoos for fun.  A nation of children that couldn't read but could run 4 electronic devices at once.  A nation of children that went to school and rarely saw anyone that didn't look like them, and if they were in a neighborhood that was diverse, well, poor people get what they get.  While they saw each other, they didn't have to like each other or respect each other.

We like our children to be protected from the ugliness of the world.  We don't want them to see or hear anything very unpleasant.
We tell them grandpa went away, send them on a playdate for the funeral.  We tell them the dog went home to be with his birth family.
We cover their ears when someone tells them beef is cow.
But we expect them to compete.  We teach them to be better than.  We teach them the world is full of winners and losers---and they were born to be winners.
We try to make sure they don't chose friends that are not winners.

So, what about everyone else?  What about all those other people?
The idea that there HAS to be a winner and losers.  The idea that OUR group is supposed to win and everyone else is supposed to be beneath us.  Where did that come from?
Why do we buy that.
Why do we teach that to our children.
Why do we compete.

There are children at school that will make fun of the child that doesn't have a lunch.
There are children at school that will split their lunch with the child that doesn't have a lunch.
There are schools that provide everyone a free lunch to keep both of the above scenarios from happening.

We know that if you ask a random 100 or more people a question, that you will most likely get the right answer to the question in strangely compiled way.  We know that if you ask that same group to estimate the size of a thing or the age of a thing their answers when averaged will be right on the line.  We know that NO ONE PERSON has ever accomplished anything great by themselves.
So why must we focus so completely on competing and treating those we walk on and put down, and turn into losers for our own gain like acceptable casualties.
Life should not be a war to be beaten.
Life is what we each have.
Enjoy your life.
Below is the lyrics of a song and a link to the song.
It made my poor mind go here.
Mary Chapin Carpenter is amazing.

When we were young, we pledged allegiance every morning of our lives
The classroom rang with children's voices under teacher's watchful eye
We learned about the world around us at our desks and at dinnertime
Reminded of the starving children, we cleaned our plates with guilty minds
And the stones in the road shone like diamonds in the dust
And then a voice called to us to make our way back home

When I was ten, my father held me on his shoulders above the crowd
To see a train draped in mourning pass slowly through our town
His widow kneeled with all their children at the sacred burial ground
And the TV glowed that long hot summer with all the cities burning down
And the stones in the road flew out beneath our bicycle tires
Worlds removed from all those fires as we raced each other home

And now we drink our coffee on the run, we climb that ladder rung by rung
We are the daughters and the sons, and here's the line that's missing

The starving children have been replaced by souls out on the street
We give a dollar when we pass, and hope our eyes don't meet
We pencil in, we cancel out, we crave the corner suite
We kiss your ass, we make you hold, we doctor the receipt
And the stones in the road fly out from beneath our wheels
Another day, another deal, before we get back home
And the stones in the road leave a mark from whence they came
A thousand points of light or shame
Baby, I don't know

Read more: Mary Chapin Carpenter - Stones In The Road Lyrics | MetroLyrics


Read more: Mary Chapin Carpenter - Stones In The Road Lyrics | MetroLyrics


https://www.youtube.comhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ekTCh5JiA0/watch?v=5ekTCh5JiA0

This last link is because--you know, baby kittens.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Baby+Kittens&&view=detail&mid=41BC90EBF209B7F805B141BC90EBF209B7F805B1&&FORM=VRDGAR