After the Storm

Every morning when I get to my office, I take out the Sharpy in my drawer and I cross through the previous day's date on my desk calendar. Not that it really makes all that much difference in my weekly scheduling efforts, but it's kind of like a mental process of saying, "Ok, yesterday is in the books, time to move on to today."


Yesterday was one of those days that I wanted to go ahead and not only cross off the previous day, but the very day I was about to begin. It was a day I've been looking forward to and dreading for months. It was a day that an event took place that, in the days leading up to it, had essentially divided a town, ended friendships and hurt families.


Crossing off Sept. 16 from my desk calendar was the best use of a Sharpy that I've ever experienced.

While registered voters were filing into the First Baptist Church in Prairie Grove, 600 miles away I spent a good portion of yesterday playing "private investigator", trying to track down the identity of an "emailer at large" who is hiding behind the cover of a fake email account. While they were stirring up havoc, innocent people were taking the heat for this cowardly person's actions. I hope whoever the person is occasionally reads Essays From Texas, because I just want you to know I'm on to you. Sending that crap from the Fayetteville Public Library was a poor attempt at covering your tracks.

Never in my life have I seen such childish mudslinging over something that in the grand scheme of things is oh so very tiny. Yet, at the same time, the decision that was made on Sept. 16 was a big deal, far more reaching past anything anyone really ever thought it would be.

But the price that was paid to get past Sept. 16 was a heavy one.

If anything, the division brought together people that would once have been unlikely friendships. Long time friendships were strengthened in faith, while others were destroyed because of foolish, selfish pride based on slander.

After the dust settles, the strongest friendships will have proven themselves, especially those who fell on different sides of the issue. But, they will remain, and probably stronger than they ever were.

When I moved back to Texas, I was given a mug that said, "Good things happen when you go for it."

I never really drink out of mugs, but I like to have them sitting on my desk because that's what desks in offices are supposed to have sitting on them. I've tried to be a coffee drinker, which at one point in my mind meant that I had stepped up in the world of professional adulthood, but I decided I would rather listen to Don Ho's "Tiny Bubbles" for 24 hours straight than choke down such liquid nastiness every morning. Nothing against coffee drinkers, it just never agreed with me much.

Anyway, that mug is a reminder to me that we can either sit like ducks in a row and let the world go by, or we can "go for it" and make a difference. Whether it's a small town campaign, a consumer education campaign (insert plug here for TexasPriceCheck.com), or sending food donations to the Texas coast - no man ever made a difference by being a sitting duck.

In perspective, this "civil division" I've been speaking of is a small conflict in a country that is experiencing much greater problems. It's hard for me to believe that as I type this blog post, people in the very state I am in are going back to find that their homes have been washed and/or blown away. Lubbock was under water a week ago, but nothing in comparison to what these people are enduring.

The storm has blown through. Now all we have to do is sift through the rubble and move on.