More than a Motto

Once a great friend (Carl Jordan), who often gave me inspired advice, once observed as I wrestled with a severe challenge: “It is what it is.  Just deal with it.”  As often with Carl, I determined that this was no mere casual advice but something I was intended to deeply implant within accessible memory. It is advice that surfaced in Walmart yesterday when I saw a T-shirt for sale with the following graphic emblazoned upon it: “These Colors Don’t Run.”

 Combining this motto with Carl’s advice results in a compass indicator directing us to deal effectively with given issues as they arise.  Our personal values are often determinant in resulting behavior.  “Dealing with it” can yield duplicity, manipulative fabrication--spinning, covering-up, contrived silence and a taboo status, hypocrisy, blatant escapism, malevolent threats, character assassination, illicit pay-offs, and cowardly acts of treachery and intimidation.

I hope that Americans look at “Don't Run” as not only standing ready to wisely exercise the Sword of the State, but also impling enlisting individual courage to speak up plainly and forthrightly with integrity and honesty concerning issues on every level.  What is the point of calling ourselves “the land of the free and the home of the brave” if we bite our lips and keep in chained silence every burning conviction smoldering within our hearts?

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