There are so many wonderful things I've learnt from you.
I want to remind you of a few.
You taught me that reading didn't end with Jack and Jill
And that books would open a world of wonder for me.
I got the message....and you made me a bookworm costume
For the carnival.
You traced my ancestry back to Ur of the Chaldees
With a bit of a detour in Poland.
You taught me to be kind to tramps
And to give a penny to the RNLI.
I went door to door with you
Raising money for Hungarian émigrés
(One of whom later became my surgery boss.)
You taught me to let dogs smell my hand before I patted them
And that circuses were cruel to animals.
You gave me 'thinkabouts' before bedtime
To keep the nightmares away
And that's the first time I heard of Fleming
And the discovery of penicillin.
You made swords of rolled up newspaper
For back garden jousting events
And a local post office from a cardboard box.
You saw the scientist underneath the Romantic
And together we looked for badgers at night
Gazed at stars
Watched a total eclipse through photographic film
Made copper sulphate crystals in the cellar.
I helped you construct a nine foot pram dinghy
To ferry a family of six--
Developing a permanent aversion to linseed oil.
You made me a long jump and a high jump
Built an igloo and brought cocoa to sip
In my warm snow cave.
You taught me to aspire
Like the fairy atop the Christmas tree
To have an enquiring mind
And be an independent thinker.
You taught me to live life as an adventure
Borrowing courage and faith from Colum Kiel.
You taught me that the love of the Lord
Is a lamp for my steps
A light for my path.
You taught me to brave the elements
To add a stone to the cairn
And never to set off down an untracked hillside
In the late afternoon.
You taught me to belay and to cast off
To read the winds and the tides
To pitch a tent
And not to forget my anorak.
(I still don't forget my anorak).
You instructed me in the political philosophy
Of Marx, Lenin and Trotsky,
Gave me a banned book by Prince Kropotkin
Imparted to me a thirst for justice
Nurtured my prophetic spirit.
You taught me not to lie
To stay out of debt
And that swearing is more effective
If you hardly ever swear.
You said that the true meaning of "God provides"
Is that everything you need is right at hand
If you just know how to look:
And that it doesn't matter if there aren't many
Of whatever it is you're looking for
Because you only need one--
And you will find it.
You showed me that privilege and responsibility
Are two sides of same coin
And that I, like little Hans
Can make a big difference.
Most of all, as good Dads do
You believed in me
And taught me to believe in myself.
That lesson, like the anorak, has stuck.
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Greetings dear ones! As I write this, I look back on a week of extreme weather phenomena--floods in Queensland Australia, a heat wave in Argentina, the New York blizzard and Britain's coldest winter on record. And I look back too, on a year of weather catastrophes, above all, the Pakistan floods, one of the worst natural disasters in history. Many Pakistani villagers face a mountain winter without food supplies, blankets or housing. Oxfam is still supplying one and a half million Pakistanis with water, while admitting they are meeting only a fraction of the need. Many of us by now are getting the message that human-caused climate change implies more than warmer weather.
Looking forward, I see a year in which the human population is expected to top the seven billion mark. Seven billion humans wreaking havoc on the environment and competing for scarce resources! Seven billion human beings, each one infinitely precious, each unique, each a potential gift of hope to the future! I contemplate the essential paradox of these two sentences. Population is a complex topic, not susceptible to pat answers. Wealthy nations have a larger environmental impact due to greater consumption, whereas people in poor nations impact endangered species as a direct result of hunger and lack of education. The carbon footprint of an average American is much greater that that of an average Indian, yet the poor of the world are suffering the effects of climate change today, without ever having reaped the benefits of life in the developed world.
If there are 'too many' of us, why give our time and money to lengthen lives by improving healthcare and nutrition? From the pragmatic perspective, the answer is that the Malthusian checks of war, famine and epidemics wreak social havoc, and social havoc is dangerous for the human and natural environment. Improved education and lower infant mortality naturally lead to lower birthrates, in turn causing population to plateau and then fall, in a more harmonious way. From the spiritual perspective, the answer is simple. As I cherish my own life, health and wellbeing, so I cherish the life, health and wellbeing of each one of the seven billion humans who are not separate from myself. A hungry child in Pakistan is my own hungry child. A cold and desperate street person is my very self. If one of us is suffering, all of us suffer. We are all one.
It is so inherent to see ourselves as the centre of our own universe. Yet the child going to bed hungry tonight, the mother in the refugee camp with no clean drinking water, the person dying of AIDS alone in a hut with nothing to eat but UN rations--each one is as special as we are, as precious as we are, each one has the same dreams, the same hopes, the same potential as we do. Take a moment to think of your greatest heroes or heroines. Where would we be without these great souls? And now remember that today, a child with the potential to be the next Alexander Fleming, the next Mahatma Gandhi, the next Rosa Parks, the next Vanadana Shiva, may die from malnutrition or preventable disease.
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The unique needs of the poor, whether in our own city or developing nations on the other side of the world, will never be met adequately by governments or large NGOs. Private philanthropy, people helping people, working through grassroots organizations, has the greatest potential to provide the poor of the world with a decent human life. Following the financial debacle of 2008, many of us have seen our retirement savings dwindle, our benefits cut, our incomes reduced. Some of us live from paycheck to paycheck while others of us no longer have a paycheck at all. Some have had to put off retirement; some have been laid off when we still need to work. Many in the US, myself included, have no protection from catastrophic illness. Facing these altered circumstances, it may be hard to recognize how immensely privileged we are compared to the rest of the world. However hard-up we may feel ourselves to be, we can spare something for those who have nothing. As citizens of our municipality, we have a duty to the hungry and homeless in our midst. As citizens of the world, we have great responsibility for the poorest members of our global community. Food for others, like food for ourselves, must be a non-negotiable expenditure.
Image by Getty Images via @daylife
Image by Getty Images via @daylife
Image via Wikipedia
Image via Wikipedia
Image by United Nations Photo via Flick
Today I'm posting a poem I wrote some years back and which is published in my anthology From My Heart to Yours.
Hanukkah
The menorah is lost
The elders are dead
Wooden synagogue burned
Torah scrolls burned
Village burned
Sanctuary desolate
The light of the covenant
Lost to our house.
It is solstice
The time of rekindling.
Fire hidden in dry cistern
Forgotten for generations
Liquid fire
Hidden in Jewish heart
Blazes forth anew.
Ancient fire
Lost and reborn
Light of all the peoples
Glints on brass lampstand
Sparkles in the window
Shines on faces of ecstatic Sufis
Streams into hearts awake with love
For Krishna, Rama, Kali, Christ, Mohammed,
Illumining, illumining.
Baruch atah adonai elohenu!
Rachel, Perel, Daniel,
On this, the birthday of your first born child
The light of Hanukkah,
Light of the menorah
Light of Torah
Returns to your
house.
