EVERYTHING IS BROKEN
My title is borrowed
from Bob Dylan, a song he wrote a couple of decades ago, that seems to aptly
describe our current state of affairs. In New England, the crumbling Big Dig
is the news of the day, where a woman was killed two weeks ago as a concrete
panel fell from the ceiling onto her car. In the midst of this controversy a
huge parking garage in Boston is being closed as it, too, begins to crumble.
Last week, Governor Romney's press conference regarding the Big Dig was
delayed by a gas leak at the Capital. These construction disasters are
quickly becoming worldwide icons of America's descent into its twilight
years. America being swallowed up by our corruption, no longer able to even
engineer, design and build a highway tunnel system. A seemingly complacent
population, happy enough to close the light on another day so long as each
one's own little world remained intact.
I see the Big Dig as being emblematic of much larger, indeed much more
dangerous, social ills. Our country has always held in great disdain, the
idea of isolationism, and yet as individuals we are becoming isolated. Keep
your own fire burning. You can see this in the Big Dig scandal, you can see
it in politics, you can see it in corporate America, and increasingly, you
see it in everybody. The climb to power, financial success, influence, and
the clinging to those stations when the walls start to crumble. It is the
faint glow of decency burning, morality slipping away, dignity, nearly a
thing of the past. Fewer and fewer among us go outside of ourselves. As John
McCain likes to say, to serve a purpose greater than ourselves. Imagine that
politics was once a noble profession. Men and women of high ideals, vision,
serving their country with no hidden agenda for their own self-promotion.
As Israel and Lebanon are in their second week of all-out war, as Iraq
continues in what has now become the norm, as North Korea continues her
quest to take over the world, as our own country is rocked with violence,
saturated with illegal immigrants, swamped in debt, I wonder sometimes...is
it all fixable? The apathy of our culture frustrates me because I happen to
feel a palpable sense of urgency about these things. "Everything Is Broken"
it seems, and in most cases, the assigned repairmen are frighteningly unfit
for the job. Our President grapples with stem-cell research, while the walls
continue to close in from every direction. The environment, another area
apparently where man is not to intercede with the divine, may render all of
the other worries moot, sooner than we think. Do you detect any sense of
urgency about these things when speaking to people you know? I am truly
curious. We have become a nation of assisted-living patients, expecting that
"someone" is taking care of this, that or the other thing. Look no further
than New Orleans to see how that worked out.
About fifteen years ago, I witnessed a head on accident in Hooksett, NH. I
pulled over, as did another guy, and we rushed over. Two elderly people in
the front seat of one car were dead. In their backseat a mother, and next to
her an infant who was jammed under the back of the front seat, still in a
child-seat. We pried the door open and cut the seatbelts to get the baby
out. An elderly woman driving the other car was in shock. Soon enough, EMT's
arrived; the other gentleman and myself went on our way. What struck me
later, beyond the obvious sorrow for this family, was that nobody stopped on
this busy road. Folks were driving around, partially on someone's lawn, and
continuing along. I thought of how I would feel if that were my wife and
child and parents....and nobody stopped. It's a very, very sad commentary.
Is it fixable? Do we have what it takes as a culture, as a people, to reign
it all in. I am not sure, frankly, and it's unspeakable, the consequences,
if we don't. There is no magic "someone" who is going to take care of it.
Elected officials? If there were an official to elect who was, at base, any
different than the rest of them, I would love to know about them. I don't
see it happening. The road to the positions of power, to the positions you
need to hold to make a difference, are littered with toll booths where, bit
by bit, you deposit your dignity, morals and ethics along the way. It's the
cost of getting there. And you thought gas was getting expensive? Wait until
you see how expensive the repairs are when everything is broken.