As you may or may not know, Pam, Lucy (my dog), and I have largely relocated from our beloved home in Southern Utah to Monroe, Louisiana, as Pam's mother, who just turned 90, needs our love and support. I am essentially a child of the American South. My mother's family came from Mississippi, my father's family sprang from the Cajun heart of southern Louisiana, and I was born in Texas and spent many of my formative years in Texas. However, this return to the South and my ancestral roots has been a powerful and unexpectedly moving experience.
One of the things I have loved about living in Monroe has been the heartfelt connections that I make with the people who live here on a day-to-day basis. The people who work with us, people whom I have met through Pam's mother's friends and at gas stations and grocery stores, and in all the different things that one does to live in this world of ours. I have been profoundly touched connecting with working class white folks and the African American community that I have missed living in Utah for so many years.
What has touched me most deeply is the kindness and dignity of these people who have crossed my path and whose beauty blesses me on a day-to-day basis. It has fostered in me what feels like a growing love for all of my brothers and sisters and the need to find a way that honors, respects, and nurtures one and all—and to move away from the politics of fear and divisiveness while at the same time deeply listening to people, and their truths, hopes, and fears.
As Ken Wilber recently said, the solutions to all of the problems that confront our human family are developmental, which means we need to transcend our worn-out and tired BS, and see and experience one another with new eyes and open hearts, growing wisdom, skillfulness, and compassion. The only way out is truly up.
May we all rise to the challenges of our time and the deep beauty that we are.
With great love and respect,
John
