I don’t generally watch a lot of TV, but I do try to catch the news for a few minutes each evening before dinner. Last night I was watching the news on NBC when I saw a story about a family whose vehicle got caught in a flash flood down in Texas. While flash floods aren’t uncommon in parts of Texas this time of year, the story caught my eye because of the way those who witnessed it reacted. A family of 4 was in a SUV and needed rescuing, the mother and father were able to get to safety without much issue, but the two small children in the back seat were going down with the car and would drown without the help of good Samaritans. What I witnessed was a group of men, from very different backgrounds and races dive into the water to save those two children, without regard for their own safety. There may have been others, but of the three men that I saw saving those kids, one was Black, one Hispanic and one Caucasian. They were able to pull the two kids out, give them CPR, and save their lives. While giving CPR, not one person suggested that any of these men should not be providing life saving techniques to those two kids. While watching that segment, I couldn’t help but think that this is the America that I was born and raised into, but I also wondered what has happened to my country.
This is not an article about what a mean and hateful America we sometimes live in, it is about what a great and loving country we are. You see, when the chips are down, I am convinced that Americans don’t really care about skin color or religion when your life a needs saving, no one ask what political party you belong to, or where you’re from. To the contrary, in America when we see someone in distress, our natural instinct is to go to that person’s rescue. Ninety-nine percent of us don’t care about our own safety, we don’t care who you are or where you’re from, or what you look like, we just know that you need help and we’re the only ones available to render aid. One of the reasons that I only watch a few minutes of the news is because unlike the story seen on NBC last evening, most of the news is bad. I don’t know about you, but I’m fed up with the bad news! We should all be focusing on the good in our country, because I assure you, there is so much more good than bad. I can’t count the number of times that I’ve been at a gas station filling up with my US Army hat on and people come from two or three islands away just to say “thanks for your service”. I am fortunate to live in a place where people actually speak to those passing by, where you can hold the door for someone and they actually say thank you with a smile. That’s the America that I know and love, and yet so many of us tend to focus on the one rude person that we encounter every day, the news story that we see where someone who doesn’t look like us commits a heinous crime.
People have become so used to watching their Social Media feeds for bad news that they can seemingly no longer recognize good news when they see it. Here’s a novel idea, why can’t we all just stop watching the “bad news”, watching our Social Media feeds and thinking that everything is going to hell. Let’s return to the days when we actually talked to each other. How many of you can remember the last time that you actually listened to what the person speaking to you was saying without trying to formulate your reply before they were finished speaking? I know that in a fast paced society we can sometimes forget that cell phones, laptops and tablets may not hold all of the answers in the world; and that by talking and listening we could do better, but it’s surely true.
Like myself, I know that many of you have traveled outside the United States, so I won’t bore you with my travels. I will only tell you that although there are other countries in which I could see myself living, America is my home, and “there’s no place like home”. This is my country, I love it, and I believe it’s the greatest country in world history. I believe that of the three hundred and fifty million people in this country, eighty-five percent are good citizens, regardless of race, religion or immigration status. Think about it, if you were one of the people in the first paragraph, would you need to know the race or immigration status of the people in that SUV before you tried to help them? I know that 99.9% of you would not, and that’s a testament to who you are, and what a great America we live in. Despite what you might see on the news, or on social media, we are all really the same, just one America, White, Black, Hispanic, Muslim, Hindu, or other, it doesn’t matter, because when the chips are down we will always be just one!
Let’s take our country back, go out tomorrow morning and say hi with a smile to everyone you encounter! Hold the door for the person behind you, and remember, 99% of the people that you encounter are going to be pleasant, so don’t let the 1% ruin your day.
I’m Just Sayin!!!