Freedom for what. . . .?

Consider your freedom today, and its price. 

Then take a look at this data on how we spend our time, state-by-state in the USA! 

Reactions? 

Time

It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills.  Actually time is neutral.  It can be used wither destructively or constructively. I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will.  We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.  We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability.  It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the fores of social stagnation.  We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.  Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy, and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.  Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity. 

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from Birmingham City Jail

6th Grade Graduation or something like it!

So, I've noticed that time rushes on.

There is no space for standing still.

The funny thing is, while time elapses quickly, a moment at a time, we seldom take careful note until the realization arrives: I'm getting a lot older!

The photo below pictures a graduation ceremony of some sort, most likely that perilous transition from elementary school to junior high!

Just for the record, that's me standing third from the left between Jimmy Foster and Jane Baker (I think).  My best buddy back then, Stan Holmes, is first from the left.  Don't we all look happy!  Maybe, just maybe on this auspicious occasion we were in touch with the fact that time was slipping past us.  Maybe or maybe not.  Clearly, if we had an inkling, we suppressed it quickly as we went about the business of "growing up," whatever that means!

The Secret Powers of Time

What follows came my way from my friend, Frank Lott. Watch it and tell me what you think about it.

60

For some reason I remember my 10th birthday. 

We'd had snow that winter (1959-1960).  Santa brought me a great, new bike.  It was red and white and chrome and very cool. I rode that bike into the ground and until I was too old and too embarassed to ride it any longer, even with the addition of the "longhorn" handle bars! 

Somewhere in the mix of that time and the celebration I recall thinking, "Fifty years from now--let's see. . .that'll be 2010--I'll turn 60!" 

Of course, that seemed a world away; clearly a lifetime down the road.  So far away that I really couldn't imagine my ever making it to that point, let alone understanding what survival would mean or entail. 

Today, that point arrived. 

I made it. 

I'm 60-years-old! 

Frankly, it feels like just another day to me.  People around me seem to be taking it harder than I. 

Of course, I'm glad to have endured.  Enjoying a 60th birthday beats any other alternative I can imagine. 

But, life passes and it fills up an hour, a moment at a time. 

I'm very grateful for the way time has filled my life. 

Last week I reflected with a friend on this matter of age and aging.  We wondered together if we could make it 15 more years in the world of work and continuing activity.  He didn't seem too sure! 

When I was ten, I couldn't really see 60.  Now that I'm 60, I strain to see 80, but it is much closer than the horizon with which I contended back in 1960 as I rode that shinny new bike. 

Life is a mystery.  Life is a gift.  I expect we need to make the most of it. . .today.