Earth-treading stars that make dark heaven light

I just finished reading an article on the NYT that leaves one cautiously optimistic about the oil spill. Basically, the amount of surface oil on the ocean is dissipating. That’s a good thing… but… I don’t know. With the ocean, well, don’t you only see the tip of the iceberg?

So here I am doubting. Lacking faith in the people who have been cleaning up the muck. Getting their hands dirty in that sultry southern heat, whilst I sit in my air-conditioned office, sipping my iced coffee, idling on the internet reading the New York Times. Wasting fuel and electricity and not doing much about a problem that supposedly gets me so irate. But you know… as much as the oil spill moved me… it gets old. Like the earthquake in Haiti. Or the war in Afghanistan. Or Fox News. They all ignite my passions… but the futility of my cries is so downright depressing… what does it matter? I’m only one of six billion people… what good does it do to get upset about these things? 

I’ve spent the better part of this year writing blogs that are mostly political. And then… somewhere in the last three or so weeks a cat has held on to my acerbic tongue. I find myself retreating the pointed questions and deleting paragraphs that I write because… well… I’ve grown apathetic. I’ve lost a little faith… that anyone cares enough to do anything except complain.

And I lose faith because… I know I’m more vocal than active about my laments with this country. Because I’m more likely to let myself get riled by the stupid cruelty of Glenn Beck and his cohorts than to go some place out of my liberal bubble and do something to make a change. And worse yet, I let those idiotic remarks make me feel the need to prove that I am as critical of this government as I was of the last. That I’m not just some sort of sheep following a charismatic leader. That I really am as intelligent and well informed… and kindhearted as I like to believe. So I doubt. I turn a disgusted eye on the things that are happening. I pshaw my disdain for the limitations of bureaucracy. The ineptitude of the ones doing the job.

Why? At what point in our society did we decide that criticism is a better motivation than faith? Than helping? Than throwing aside our discontent and just doing something to get it done? Because the greater good is… well… a clean ocean. And a clean ocean means fish. And fish means jobs. And jobs mean… well, you know. So why… why are we arguing about helping people? Why is it more important to point fingers than to fix the problem?

That’s human nature. Deflecting responsibility. Deciding that if one didn’t make a mess, one shouldn’t have to clean it up. Except… there are people who just do it anyway, who do it because it has to be done. Because they recognize that if they don’t do it, everyone else is just going to sit on the sidelines and let the mess get worse.  And yet when they clean the mess, they get the dirt on their hands... and with it the blame that no one else wants to take.

Maybe this isn’t the end. Or even the start of the end of the oil spill. But good God, it’s amazing that there is a light, however miniscule, that is now visible. That even if someone wants to complain about how long it took, about how much money is wasted on PSAs, that the ‘liberal’ media is spinning this sliver to make themselves look good… it is still good. And I am going to focus on that. Because I’m tired of being angry at the other side. I’m tired about fighting the nuance of how to fix a problem we all want fixed. I just want to say, good job.

And you know, a good job makes me believe it can be done. That even under the cloud of anger and vicious complaining, people make things happen.  It makes me want to write again.