Like many of you, I am living in times I only imagined in books and history class. I periodically ask if I’m doing what I expected to be doing if “x” happened because “x” is happening almost every single day. I didn’t choose this historic time in the United States that is suddenly not living up to the expectations of many of us. Even so, I continue to wake up to it every day. 

Dear Neighbor, 

As my independent father, born in the early 20th century, continued to live alone into his 90s, I called him each morning on the way to work. “Morning, Daddy, how are you?” Every day, without fail, his reply was, “I’m fine, it’s a choice I make every day.” For Daddy, “being fine” was a way to live a life centered upon what he valued and appreciated and less on his aging body or things out of his control. He was someone who could find the good others might miss. 

Daddy was a farmer who went to public work in his late 30s to make a steady living for his family. He became a master craftsman, a patternmaker, creating mahogany patterns for the molds used to make machinery parts. He was lucky to find a career he liked, although he continued to farm his entire life. He lived through the depression, WWII and too many wars that followed. As a boy, he witnessed the first electric lights turned on in Cleveland. He lived long enough to call and ask what a “blog” was and remained clear headed and curious to the day he died. He understood hardship and adversity and possessed the personality to be able to embrace living rather than worry about what could have been. He didn’t fear death and he freely talked about the end of life to me as a child as another part of living a life. This is the man who got up and walked back to the bedroom, saying he felt unwell, and died a few minutes later. For him, this was living. 

My white haired self is now aging and, as Daddy would laugh and say, “closer to the end than I’ve ever been.” At church the other week I reached over and grasped a younger mom’s hand as we both looked at each other and sighed in a moment of quiet after another week of political chaos. “Whatever,” I said and we both smiled. “Whatever it is.” She nodded.  

We don’t get through difficult times alone, even when we think we’re lucky or make our luck. I believe we get through times by being our genuine self and continuing to live a life that includes others. Those others don’t have to be family or church or best friends or spouse. Sometimes, particularly during the current political divides in our country, we can’t even turn to those who were once pivotal in our lives. Yet we can still smile and say something pleasant to the frazzled cashier, delight in a child’s discovery, or listen to a neighbor’s story. Yes, stuff happens that you can’t always fix. It doesn’t mean you stop living a life. Some days (and times) are just… different. 

Like many of you, I am living in times I only imagined in books and history class. I periodically ask if I’m doing what I expected to be doing if “x” happened because “x” is happening almost every single day. I didn’t choose this historic time in the United States that is suddenly not living up to the expectations of many of us. Even so, I continue to wake up to it every day.  

Activist and musician Joan Baez said, “You don’t get to choose how you’re going to die. Or when. You can only decide how you’re going to live. Now.” What true words. 

A recent conversation on living in these times from a historian who specializes in the politics and political culture of the American Revolution and early American history, Dr. Joanne Freeman, addressed our current reality in the United States. She believes we must be committed to doing what we need to do to push our way through whatever gets thrown in our direction. “Because we can and because we can do it together.” She often ends her videoed conversations with these words, “Be strong and of good courage,” to encourage the importance of engagement during difficult political and social times and as a reminder of a need to believe in the human heart.

Wishing my neighbors the strength to continue the fight for the better good and mornings that begin, “I am fine. It’s a choice I make every day.”    

“Dear Neighbor” authors are united in a belief that civility and passion can coexist. We believe curiosity and conversation make us a better community.