Senator Kennedy: Rest In Peace

Senator Kennedy: Rest In Peace

When I think of Senator Edward Kennedy, I will remember him as a powerful force for good. He has championed the rights of ordinary Americans for well over forty years. He was a devoted public servant.

I learned of his death this morning, and although we all knew of his illness over the past year, somehow, many of us hoped against hope that he would somehow summon all of his considerable strength and overpower this most fearsome enemy – the cancer that finally carried him off.

But one interesting detail of his story had been buried so deep within my memory that I was actually jolted when it came up this morning: Returning home one night from a party, a young woman who was a passenger in his car was drowned when his car plunged into the river. Ted Kennedy swam to safety.

In 1969, when I heard this news, I was angry, even outraged, at his behavior. I was quick to speculate on his relationship with Mary Jo Kopekne and the alcohol level in his blood at the time of the accident. I wrote him off as a “light-weight”.

But now, 40 years later, all of that has faded into ancient history. His work in the senate on behalf of the American people has been stellar. His impassioned oratory has been inspiring to millions of us. Even his political enemies have had to bestow a grudging respect for the “Lion of the Senate”.

So here is the take-away for me: redemption. No matter what our mistakes, our failings, our shortcomings, even our sins, there is always the possibility of redemption. We can not go back and fix the past, but in the present, we can at least atone and move on. Where there is life, there is always the possibility of redemption of the soul. It may or may not come from a personal God. And whether or not it can come after we’ve left this earth, it is certainly within our grasp while we are here.

Bravo, Ted Kennedy. Thank you for reminding me that there is always hope for Amazing Grace. Rest in peace.

A MIRACLE

A MIRACLE

Yesterday the citizens of Iraq had their first free election in decades. Watching the footage on television, I was awestruck by the courage of these people. With the reality of suicide bombers in some cases, just around the corner, with the sound of gunfire as a constant background noise, with the tense, tight security and soldiers everywhere, with people being frisked routinely – even in one case I saw, a man in a wheelchair – it is a testimony to the human spirit that so many brave souls – men and women – dared to venture to the polls and make their choices, faced by a ballot with hundreds of names and a myriad of parties to consider. In case you didn’t happen to see it on CNN – There was, literally, dancing and singing in the street. Many voters brought their small children with them so that the children could witness this historic moment. Iraqi expatriates from all corners of the globe showed up at polls in fourteen nations to express their support for and solidarity with their country.

I had to ask myself if I would be so brave under similar circumstances. I honestly don’t know. I have never been deprived of my right to vote. I’ve been voting for some thirty-five years, and even if I didn’t like the ultimate outcome of an election, I knew I had the inalienable right to voice my opinion and to have my opinion counted. (Well, mostly, but that is a discussion for another day). I have never had my life threatened by the simple act of walking to my polling place. We don’t really know what we are capable of doing until we are faced with the situation.

As much as I have been opposed to the invasion of Iraq, and as little as I like many of the opinions and policies of the current administration, I have to admit that – for now, at least – it appears that the sacrifices of people of this country and others may have served a very high purpose. Whatever the true motivations for our military intervention in the first place, I cannot argue with what happened yesterday.

There was some violence, which is tragic. There may be more violence in the future, but hopefully, less and less. Free people tend to prosper, and prosperous people tend to love peace.

But there was a decided victory yesterday. No matter what the outcome of this election, the people of Iraq have come out in droves to defy terrorism and to stand up for their autonomy. That is a miracle.

© 2005, Robin Munson

WE CAN HOPE

WE CAN HOPE

I am saying a prayer for the people of Iraq today. Tomorrow is their election, and the violence has been escalating for a long time.

Last night on the news, a reporter interviewed an elderly Iraqi man who said that he would vote tomorrow “if the weather is good”. The reporter explained that “good weather” could be taken to mean no bombings, no shooting, and no rocket-propelled grenades in the streets.

I was never in favor of our intervention in Iraq. Now that we’re there, we can hardly turn our backs on the Iraqi people, whose country has been turned upside down in the effort to oust Sadam Hussein. More than anything, I wish we could bring our troops home and in so doing, could stop the bloodshed. That doesn’t seem to be possible.

So for today, I think the only thing we can do as a nation is to hope. We can hope that tomorrow will be relatively peaceful. We can hope that the Iraqi people will not be too intimidated to leave their homes and visit the polls. We can hope that the Iraqi troops have been trained sufficiently to handle whatever situations come along, and that our own troops will provide adequate support wherever they are needed.We can hope that the election itself will be orderly and fair, and that it will in fact reflect the will of the people. We can hope that a fair and peaceful election will help to bring about positive changes for the people of Iraq.

Maybe if people all over the world are hoping the same thing, it will be a very powerful prayer sent up to Allah, God, Buddha, Fate, Jesus, or the Universe. Who knows? We can hope.

© 2005, Robin Munson

I SPEAK AMERICAN

I SPEAK AMERICAN

Last night we were out with friends, and somewhere along the way, I found myself telling part of the story of my immigrant grandparents and how they happened to come to this country. I don’t know what was running through our friends’ minds at the time, but I found myself compelled to talk about it, even while I knew it was probably not appropriate light dinner conversation.

It runs like a rich, dark thread through the tapestry of my life, this saga of four brave people from Eastern Europe in the early years of the twentieth century. My father’s parents came to this country from Romania. My mother’s mother was from Hungary. My mother’s father was from Czechoslovakia. They were all young – under twenty-five. They were all Jewish. And at some point, each of them individually made the decision to leave everything they knew and loved behind to take a chance on the “New World”.

I never knew my father’s parents – they died before I was born. The stories about them are all from their life together after they met in Pittsburgh. Those stories are colorful, textured, and delightful thumbnail sketches of the people they portray.

But I did know my mother’s parents. Some of the stories have been passed down to me directly by my grandmother. Some of them come to me from my mother. The history of my grandmother and grandfather before they came to the United States are epic. They depict the horrors that motivated people to make the terrifying leap of faith, boarding a steamer and traveling in steerage across the Atlantic to a country they have never seen where the language, the customs, and even the food is totally foreign to them.

I will give you a sample – the same story I found myself retelling last night. My grandmother grew up in a tiny town in Hungary called Rozhehegye (Rose hedge). It was close to the Danube River, just across from Vienna, Austria. (My grandmother attended secretarial school in Vienna, taking a ferry across the Danube every day. She spoke fluent German, as well as Hungarian, Russian, and Czech).

When Grandma was a little girl, the Russians invaded and occupied Hungary. Among many of the rules they instituted, they decreed that Hungarians should no longer speak Hungarian, but were compelled to speak Russian only (at least in public). Grandma was walking to school alongside her best friend, and naturally, they were chattering away in Hungarian. A couple of Russian soldiers appeared and, having overheard the conversation, shouted, “No Hungarian! Speak Russian!” My grandmother’s friend, being a spunky little girl shouted back, “I am Hungarian! I speak Hungarian!” One of the soldiers simply lifted his rifle and shot the little girl dead – right in front of my Grandma.

There are many other stories about my grandmother and grandfather’s experiences in Europe. But this one, perhaps more than any other, speaks to me personally. It is emblematic of what brought them to their new home. In fact, I would venture to say that it is emblematic of what brought many, many immigrants to this country. That brave little girl’s spirit lived on in my grandmother and probably helped her to make that horrendous crossing to Ellis Island.

My grandparents (all four of them) learned English. I am told that they rarely lapsed into their native languages or even Yiddish except when they were fighting and didn’t want the children to know what they were saying. They worked hard at their new language and became fluent early on. But the important thing was that they spoke English by choice. Not by force. That’s why they loved this country so much. My grandmother would have proudly stated, “I am American. I speak American”.

© 2005, Robin Munson