Washington Irving’s character “Rip Van Winkle” slept through 20 years and returned to a changed village. I’ve only been out of it for 2 weeks. We’ve been in France (the French side of the Caribbean island of Saint Martin) since Jan. 19. That was the day before the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday (a day of equality, mercy, inclusion, and service to others) and the day of beginning of the end (grabbing all the money and power you can by those lusting for more).
The historian Dom Crossan taught me this truth: “The history of civilization reveals that you can have a Republic and you can have an Empire; but you can’t have both for long.”
In Lin Manuel Miranda’s musical “Hamilton” the second act opens with the beginning of the American Republic and Thomas Jefferson returning from France. Red-faced James Madison greets his return with these words: “Thomas, we are engaged in a battle for our nation’s very soul. Can you get us out of the mess we’re in? Hamilton’s new financial plan is nothing less than government control. I’ve been fighting for the South alone. Where have you been?”
Thus begins Jefferson’s song “What’d I Miss?”…. “What’d I miss? I’ve come home to this! Headfirst into a political abyss! What’d I Miss?”
Being unplugged for two weeks, I too wonder what’d I miss? You can speak it, write it, rap it, or think it but I’m curious what your answer would be to my question: “What’d I miss?”
