“There is much to do and no time to lose because the soul of our country is on the line. We must be brave and stand up.”
~~ Congressman Jerry Nadler

Artwork commissioned for the sole use by Maggie C.

The soul of our country… I’ve been giving a lot of thought lately to the soul of our country; to the soul of our society; to the soul of our generation. And – for that matter – to my own soul.

I am not in any position to preach. I’m not immune to biases; to the divisive mindset of “us” versus “them;” to the smugness of believing that my soul is in the right place; to the complacency of assuming that it’s those “other souls” that need adjustment, and so I have the right – nay, the duty – to sit here at my laptop spewing rhetoric about the lost soul of our country.

And yet, just yesterday I wrote about the gutting of our societies’ values and mores. Life is so complicated these days.

I respect Congressman Nadler’s statement as quoted above from his essay on “How We Resist Trump and his Extreme Agenda.” And standing alone, it does not convey his full meaning in those words. But I find the part about “no time to lose” rather thought-provoking. And that other part: “the soul of our country is on the line.” What does that even mean? And exactly when did our country’s soul become “on the line?”

Was it the day Donald Trump declared candidacy? Was it the day Hillary Clinton began using a private email server for official government communications? Was it the day Vladimir Putin took a liking to one presidential candidate over another?
Will it become paramount on Friday of this week when a new president takes the helm of our soul-conflicted country?

And when did this country’s questionable soul status reach the tipping point to where there is suddenly “no time to lose?”

As I said before… Life is complicated.

I would also say, metaphorically, that life is not a 50-yard dash. Life is a marathon. We begin the moral leg of the marathon on the day we make our first ethical choice, and to beat my metaphor to a bloody pulp, I can say that the marathon is run one step at a time; one ethical choice at a time.

Artwork commissioned for the sole use by Maggie C.

No time to lose? Perhaps. Time to assess whether we are on the right track (there’s that pesky metaphor again)? I would say yes. And today I’m doing that as best I can. And I will do so tomorrow. I will do so on Friday, the day of the presidential inauguration.

I will do so — and continue to do so – because that’s how a marathoner stays in the race. And – ultimately — because my soul is on the line.

The Daily Post one-word prompt: Marathon