A few thoughts: Prosperity, Poverty, and Providence.
I felt the steel cold breeze upon my cheek this morning as I left work. It had been a long night, and I was longing for my warm safe bed waiting at home. Anxiety quietly crept into my thoughts as I took to the icy roadway, and the 45 minute drive ahead. I turned on the radio to distract the toxic mixture of hope, and dread playing out scenarios in my head, but I knew the answer would be: "Just deal with it, and move on kid." Lord knows I will try, but it is hard not to remember the past, the images, and the lessons it has taught me.
I grew up quite fortunate in a land of limitless possibilities; two hard working parents, and a household full of kids where grandma, and grandpa lived just up the street. I was a crossing guard in sixth grade. We put up the flag every morning, and took it down before dark. I learned to tie knots, respect myself, God others, and the rule of law as a Boy Scout. Indeed, I lived in a land of the free, and home of the brave.
I served overseas, and saw the prosperity of a free Europe I knew had been stained with the blood of my brothers a generation or two before me. I remember the smell of rot, and decay in a small Honduran village where poverty reigned over a populace stricken with little opportunity, and an uncertain future.
Now, as I recall a distant frigid winter between battlefields long before my time, I hear an echoing belief in divine providence being recited in a humble prayer offered up to heaven. A disciplined soldier kneels before his maker pleading for an answer to spare a ravaged army from despair.
Today, I saw a patriot take leave, and fly off to warmer shores to contemplate another course. My heart went with him into the clouds until my sight of him was diminished, but my vision of hope remains; my dreams of providence sustains. Godspeed Captain, my Captain.
D.A. Wittler 1/20/21
