Posted in poetry, tagged acceptance, appreciation, choice, gratitude, inspiration, neighborhood, peace, perspective, positive attitudes, racial equality on February 19, 2025| 1 Comment »
Your neighbor is the man who needs you. Elbert Hubbard
My Integrated Neighborhood
“Need help carrying groceries?”
a young man calls from across the street.
Wednesday evening and our trash cans
are at the curb ready for weekly pickup.
Our next-door neighbor
moved them before he
tended to his own.
I smile at gifts surrounding
my husband and me,
at the brown, black, and white faces
that reveal hearts exploding with care.
Garbage exists
inside and outside the population.
Love moves it along.
Posted in inspiration, tagged choice, gratitude, integration, National Geographic, perspective, positive attitudes, racial equality on August 23, 2024| 3 Comments »
I dwell in possibility… (Emily Dickinson)
As I sweep the kitchen floor my head sweeps through thoughts about something tinier than dust particles. The article I am reading in National Geographic says an ape’s DNA is 99% the same as a human being’s DNA. And the pages expand into names for genes. Specific numbers. Symbols for magnificent, infinitesimal differences.
And possibilities.
The facts debunk the notion that race is more significant than skin color. I live in an integrated community. Move? No way. Not with neighbors willing to help my husband and me, obviously older folks. What shade is their skin? Anywhere from peach to ebony.
A wave across the street. A hug. Come by for coffee. My husband may offer a beer. If only I could transport the experience to other parts of this country. Sometimes I don’t realize how blessed I am.
Do I see their different colors? Of course. The same way I see the color of the tulips before the deer eat them, the variations of color inside my husband’s favorite Columbine in spring. Depths both inside and outside.
reprinted from my blog published on March 3, 2019
Posted in inspiration, tagged choice, determination, encouragement, experience, grandparent, gratitude, inspiration, perspective, positive attitudes, quote Dr. Martin Luther King, racial equality on January 16, 2023| 2 Comments »
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches
Dear Dr. Martin Luther King,
May I speak to the Martin you were when your grandmother died?
Thanks.
I’m asking because I’m a grandmother now. My grandchildren look to me to discover who they are. They learn from the attention I give to them. By my presence. Death took your grandmother and hope left you.
You regained more than hope. You let an entire group of people know who they are.
It’s a privilege to be a grandparent. And yet the child inside me pretends to be gone. I developed into a loving, accomplished woman who helped pay a stranger’s bill in a grocery store. Yet, I struggle sometimes to feel important enough to get past moments when I was a lost child too. The sun is not gone. The world celebrates today because you planted love, Dr. King. I can’t deny recurrent feelings but can allow them to pass and recognize the whole.
Love, may we learn to allow it to spread inside and outside of our families and neighborhoods.
The illustration is taken from a public domain drawing. There are many, just as Dr. King’s gifts are many.
terrypetersen 