Tag: responsibility

Service over Self

Tuesday the 19th of February 1945 marks the 75th anniversary of the storming of Iwo Jima by some 80,000 U.S Marines. This small island in the Pacific played a critical role in the pacific theater and waged on for 36 days killing more than 6,000 American Soldiers.

Four days later Joe Rosenthal snapped perhaps the most iconic war picture from the second World War. The image is of six soldiers from the 28th regiment 5th division Marines triumphantly raising the stars and stripes on top of Mt. Suribachi. Of these 6 Marines, 3 of them would answer the ultimate call of service to their country and leave the island draped under an American flag in the name of ensuring democracy for our nation and for others.

Fast forward to 74 years and 364 days and you would find me sitting in the jury waiting room at 8:30 A.M Monday morning. I’m pretty sure that no one gets that letter in the mail and thinks to themselves ” Oh, Sweet. Jury duty I’m pumped about that.” However, the level of disdain and utter lack of respect for a constitutional right was appalling by a few of the people who were sitting in that same room with me. One fellow juror who was picked in the group before me was back down in the waiting room a few minutes later and joyously announced he had been removed from his duties and could leave. I later overheard that when asked to take his hat off when entering the courtroom by a bailiff he told him in several words that were not going to use in this blog how he felt about that. Essentially this gentleman and I use that term loosely was rewarded for actions that should have left him sitting in contempt of court for the rest of day.

12-20-2020

A lot has changed since I started this blog post in mid-February of this year. I’ve got quite a few incomplete thoughts saved in the cloud and every once in a while it’s nice to come back and read them and utilize what I’ve learned since hitting save to finally finish out the puzzle.

I remember being so disappointed in a large portion of that room on that Monday in February. I heard a lot of me, me, me this is so terrible, horrible and a major inconvenience for me! Why did I have to get picked for this, I don’t want to be here, I’m going to tell the judge I hate cops, criminals, or whatever I need to say to get out of this. Did I really want to be there doing my part as a citizen of this country, NO, I did not! But when you are called upon to be a part of something bigger than yourself you make the necessary sacrifices to answer that call. And the call of sitting in an air-conditioned room all day is a very lite load to bear by the way.

The men who served in world war 2 didn’t want to leave their families for years on end, they didn’t want to work under the horrendous conditions they faced and they surely didn’t want to die on some far off island in the pacific. But they answered the call for the greater good of America and the world. They made sacrifices to their freedoms that I will likely never understand and hope never to experience. The next time I think that something in 2020 is a horrible inconvenience for me or is an encroachment on my freedom I’m going to think about the guys who raised that flag for their brothers living and dead and remember that I don’t have a leg to stand on.

who can change the world.

“One person can make a difference, and everyone should try.”

John F. Kennedy

So not to brag but I am an O.G Facebook user (15+years) not sure how proud of that I am but I figured I would put it out there. Today I got one of those memory posts that came across my feed from 9 years ago today and it was the above quote from JFK. I’ve always loved that quote, I just wish that I could remember why I posted it almost a decade ago.

Fast forward to today and that quote means more to me now then ever. We are in truly uncertain times right now and the stress of this global situation is weighing heavily on everyone, me included. I get busy with work, the kids, making dinner and then you see a news report about all the bars closing in your state for a month and then it hits you right in the gut again, this is going to be a long and bumpy ride.

The only thing that gives me solace in those low moments is that although limited we can have an impact on how this chapter of our life’s plays out over the rest of 2020. The actions that we take in this early phase of covid-19 could significantly speed up or slow down the spread of the virus. This is where you and I can make a difference and we rally need to put a little effort into this.

I have always believed two things when it comes to government. The divine sovereignty of the individual is the fundamental building block to western democracy. The second is to never follow blindly anything the government is trying to sell you, having a healthy level of skepticism helps keep things in check.

Now is not the right time to stand on those principals. If the federal government, CDC and your state at local government is asking for you to stay home and self isolate it’s not just to keep you out of a bar so you can keep your St Patrick’s day drinking to a minimum. They are doing it to slow down the exponential growth pattern that viruses like this one tend to follow. Just for a reference point here’s an exponential growth pattern.

2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512 and 1,024. Everything is pretty manageable in those first 5 iterations but it starts to get out of control really quickly in that last 5 of the sequence. Research on the virus has suggested that it doubles every 3 days, so that sequence above is 2 peoples impact played out over a period of a month.

I don’t know about you but I don’t want to be the person responsible for making 1,000 people sick in a month. If that means I can’t go to the beach or a restaurant for the foreseeable future I’m good with it. I want this thing to be over just as much as anyone right now so we can get back to “normal” its up to us how long it takes.

If we all fall in line and do as we have been asked maybe this thing blows over in a couple of weeks and everyone can tell me they were right and I was an idiot for being so worried. In fact I hope your right and I can take the insult, I’ve been called a lot worse then that in my life. But maybe we keep this rebellious streak working and the math starts to add up and were stuck in our houses until August then what?

Here is our chance to live the message. One person can make a difference and if we all try the results could be huge.