Babes in Arms

I began the day with that little piece about Three Kings Day and later, stumbled upon something I wrote 14 years ago in 2011, 5 weeks after the birth of my granddaughter Zadie. It reminded me of the horrific association with January 6, 2021, and the extraordinary shame that the man who inspired it is back in power. But simply whining and tearing whatever hair I have left out accomplishes nothing. In this long ago piece, I came up with an out-of-the-box suggestion that circles back to the babe in the manger. The kind of solution that actually could awaken us from our trance of doing the same old things with the same old horrific results.  

Our last night in the nation’s capital was spent circumambulating around the Capitol Building on a cold, crisp evening. From the Capitol steps, the multicolored Christmas tree was perfectly aligned with the Washington Monument in the distance, while in the night sky to the left, the crescent moon hung low with Venus its companion. Five-week old Zadie was snuggled close to my chest in blissful sleep and as we circled the building clockwise, I couldn’t help but offer some prayers of hope. 

 

Inside that building, the circus of power would awaken again in the New Year, wholly unmindful of the innocent little girl that I carried and millions like her. After seeing the line-up of clowns vying to be Ringmaster (with clips from the Daily Show), a circus ever more absurd and shameless and frankly, unbelievable, I worried for her future. Any one of the 8^th graders at my school running for student council would be better qualified. And though one side seems, to my eyes, clearly more desperate and full of buffoonery masquerading as functioning adults, the big balloon of hope so many of us felt three years ago has had its air forced out by the self-referential game of politics so extraordinarily out of touch with simple common sense and common human decency. (Astonishing to think that I wrote that during Obama’s Presidency, utterly incapable of imagining how much lower we would sink and sink and sink again!)

 

Perhaps this has always been so. Perhaps not. Especially if one is to take to heart all the quotes engraved in stone in Washington’s monuments—the recent Martin Luther King Memorial, the FDR, the Jefferson, the Lincoln Memorial. Profound, inspiring, compassionate and hopeful quotes that lift us from our seats in the media circus and set us squarely on the ground, helping us to come back to our senses and remember that this country was built on a vision that needs to be constantly renewed each generation, each decade, each year, each day. In my role as the first Buddhist-Jewish-music-teacher-jazz-pianist-bagpipe-playing President (watch for me on the ticket!), I would march the Senate and House of Representatives down from the hill on a monthly field trip and have each one choose a quote and write an essay about, concluding with its relevance to the bill at hand. 

 

I’d also have them walk (dance?) around the Capitol Building at least once a month with a baby in their arms and renew their vows to offer that child a plausible future. Then switch babies to make sure that they weren’t lobbying just for their kind.