After all is said and done, we rely on ourselves
Freedom is a precious gift I possess but only sparingly. So much is decided for me. Some things I dont like, but that doesnt seem to matter. Old sayings come to mind: If you cant take the heat, get out of the kitchen. But what if Im hungry?
Many citizens in Highland oppose wind turbines. If petitions and public appeals count, then why did the wind turbines carry the day? If the majority of citizens really did want wind turbines, how did they make their will known?
Id like to know how to make my views known to the ones who have the power to make the decisions. Obviously speaking up at public hearings, writing letters to the editor, and attending public planning meetings and otherwise participating in public debate doesnt matter. Please tell me what I need to do to influence a supervisor. Do supervisors, by virtue of election, really know what is best for me, better than I know myself?
And what of the undecided or the apathetic? Can they really remain outside the fray, free from the stigma and burden of making a decision?
Some will go to court to stop the wind turbines. Whether they win or fail, we are all left with a problem: What do we do then? What adjustments will people have to make to live here in the aftermath of the court decisions?
It was sad to see our government show such disregard for the feelings of so many people. Excuses abound as to why the feelings of so many shouldnt matter, such as: they are not from here, they dont care about working families, and they are not farmers. Accusations and denial are not productive ways to solve problems. It is degrading to be treated this way, both for the victim and the victor.
I believe in the old sayings: no good deed goes unpunished, good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people, and justice is blind. I think folk wisdom like this can serve folks like us in finding a suitable end to the difficulties before us.
When our little tempest in a teapot cools off, well be left with less than we had. What we are fighting for, so huge to so many here, so small to so many more living elsewhere, seems irrelevant when the power of individual choice is taken away. We squabble over thousands of dollars when overlords far beyond our little piece of paradise piddle away billions.
Turkey farmers have told me how hard it is to make a living, when the huge, multinational food conglomerate decides Highland doesnt fit into the global market and takes its breeding turkeys somewhere else. Will wind-turbine beneficiaries always receive the blessings of their benefactors? Divide and conquer is another saying from old times that still has a ring of truth to it.
We must attend to one another. There are deep wounds that must be treated. When does the healing begin? Has it started already?
We must join together for a common good and a common cause, or we will fall prey to others who are more united and focused in their objectives than we are in ours.
The wound goes deeper than the most recent vote on wind power. It goes to the building of the dam, which displaced families from their land, to the loss of a possible prison and its jobs, and to the lack of industry and opportunity. It goes back to the departure of the last black family from Highland because there was no place to send their children and the realization, at least to them, that Highland was not paradise to everyone. It goes to the loss of children who grow up and move away to find work, and to the time when Kubler-Rosss house burned mysteriously when she wanted to help children with AIDS. Deeper still, it goes to the loss of cultural identity as immigrants bring their new and unfamiliar ways to this land of Scots-Irish and German immigrants.
But none of this matters when considered against the backdrop of all of human history. Nations have spread over the surface of the earth, pushing aside whoever and whatever stands in their way. One culture gives way to the next, only to be displaced by yet another. Governments, religions, technology all change, all pass, from one generation to the next.
We are but passengers, children in the back seat of the family car, going places decided by our parents. But we in the back seat have each other. Thats all we have and that is what we must deal with.
How one person treats another is a choice. That may be the most important and hopeful choice within his or her power.
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