Hope for Humanity

Hope for Humanity

Perhaps there is still hope for humanity.

I should have known from the outset that things were not going to go well. We planned our trip to Albuquerque at one of the worst possible times of the year. February. After several searches for flights to Albuquerque we finally found reasonably priced tickets out of Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Since it was going to be a 6:00 a.m. flight we decided to spend the night before in a motel in Scranton. I went online and made reservations. When the confirmation came I saw that the date was set for November. How could I have missed this?

I called the motel and the nice clerk made the necessary changes. We were good to go. Oh, but if only it wasn't February in the great northeast!

On the morning of the day we were to leave for Scranton I received a text message from the airlines that our flight had been cancelled due to weather conditions. We pondered our plight and decided that if we could change our departure out of Harrisburg that we could still get to Albuquerque.  Kathy at Delta was so kind and helpful. I could pull words straight from the Boy Scout Law to describe her. Helpful. Friendly. Courteous.  Kind. Cheerful. It took her a little time but she had us booked on flights that would get us to Albuquerque at our originally scheduled arrival time.

The trip to Harrisburg was not as treacherous as I had anticipated. However, I received another text message that our flight from Harrisburg had been delayed by three hours. There would be no possible way we would make our connection in Atlanta to Albuquerque.

While we dealt with this dilemma we became acquainted with a nice young man (I say young because he was younger than me) who was dealt the same blow that we had been given, only he was trying to get to Seattle. We commiserated together and shared ideas as to how we could make our ways to our destinations. We talked several times in Harrisburg and Atlanta.

By the time we left Harrisburg, Delta had rebooked us on flights from Atlanta to Salt Lake to Albuquerque. Once again, making these connections seemed impossible because of the 20 minute layover in Atlanta. Enter Rachelle from Delta.  In a matter of minutes she put us on a direct flight to Albuquerque. Yes, it gave us a late arrival, but we would not be running in the Atlanta airport to a flight that would leave without. Even if we could have made the flight, who wants to spend all that time and those miles on the plane? And every additional layover increases the risk of problems.

While waiting for our Albuquerque flight Susan began talking to a woman seated next to her. She was returning home to New Mexico. As the conversation evolved Susan revealed that she was born and raised in Los Alamos and that I had retired from the police department there. The woman's face lit up as Susan explained our history in Los Alamos and she asked if I might remember her relative Wayne Byers who had also been a police officer in Los Alamos. "Of course, I do!" Susan gave the woman my name and thus the connection would be complete when she returns home.

Most of our luggage made it to Albuquerque. The lady at the Delta baggage claim area was so helpful. She tracked down the lost bag in seconds and sent us away with a little kit of toiletries (and a T-shirt) and assurances that the bag would be delivered to the motel the next day. It was.

Most rental car agents are pushy, but Kyle at the Hertz counter was kind, considerate, and very accommodating. He was very understanding of our tired situation, and the man staffing the check-in process at the La Quinta graciously accepted my request to keep the suitcase for us when it arrived the next day. When I walked into the motel lobby late the next night he recognized me right away and offered to carry the bag to our car. I assured him that I would be able to handle it

I realized on my trip that I had forgotten my camera battery and charger, a big mistake for me. I checked online and saw that I could buy a battery and charger for my camera for about $30.00 at Walmart. I went to the small Walmart in Los Lunas and found every battery and charger that Canon makes except for mine. I began looking at cameras for a temporary fix to my problem when Carolyn, the store sales associate in electronics offered to sell me a display model camera for $25.00. It was small enough to fit inside my shirt pocket, but powerful enough to take more than adequate snapshots. I made the purchase on the spot. Later when I tried to connect the USB cable to the camera I discovered that the wrong cable had been placed with the camera. I returned to Walmart and Carolyn spotted me before I could approach her. I explained the situation and she quickly found a GoPro device that connected to multiple size ports. It was priced at $15.00, but she simply gave it to me with the approval of her supervisor.

Lots of things went wrong on our way to Albuquerque, but lots of people went out of their way to make things right. In an era of public relations and customer service nightmares, five companies along with these special employees get an A+ this time. Thank you Delta Airlines, Hertz, Choice Hotels, La Quinta, and Walmart for having staff who were effective, efficient, and willing to treat this customer with concern and dignity. I will remember these acts of kindness when I next travel, especially in the winter.

My high school friend Linda Steep Benson asked me about our trip I explained all that happened along with all the helpful people we met along the way.  She commented back to me that it was nice that I was able to be philosophical about everything. These people made it easy. Yeah, there is still hope for humanity.

Reasonable Calm Respectful Discussion

I posed a question today on Facebook, prefaced with a comment and observation.  This is what I said.

“Perhaps I have too much time on my hands. I don’t know. But, the question I find repeating itself in my mind this morning is this. Why is it that we must spend so much time, energy, and angst over our differences? Why can’t we focus on those things we share in common and build on those together? The focus on our differences is driving such a wedge in the fabric of our nation that I fear that it will again be torn apart and I’m not certain that any amount of mending will make it better.”

I was quite serious with my questions and about my observations.

We used to be a melting pot of cultures, ideas, and values.  Oh, yes, to be sure there were exceptions and exclusions, but we’ve come such a long way.  Two ethnic groups have struggled for such a long, long time to fit into this melting pot but have met with such little success.  Blacks and Native American Indians have struggled forever to make it onto that so-called level playing field.  While blacks are making progress at breaking through that brick wall to equality, those who claim this American continent as their ancestral home have lagged far, far behind.  But, I’m not totally convinced that they want to be in the melting pot.  I’m not sure that they want to give up their identity and frankly, I’m not sure that I can blame them.  I believe they have an inherent right to maintain their identity. 

As a side note, Native Americans on average have three times the suicide rate as that of the rest of the American population.  On some reservations the suicide rate is ten times the national average.  According to the PEW Research Center, 26% of Native Americans live in poverty while less than half that number of whites live in poverty.  PEW also reports that 11% of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives drop out of high school before graduation compared to 5% of whites (Hispanics have a 13% dropout rate), and 17% of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives have bachelor degrees compared to 33% of whites with that four-year degree (Asians have a startling 60% bachelor degree attainment).  The Bureau of Justice Statistics show that victimization rates for simple assault, aggravated assault, rape, and robbery are double that of the rest of the general population.  One in 30 Native American children under the age of 14 is victim of abuse, which is double that of the rest of the general population of the United States (Earle, K. and Cross, A. [2001]. Child Abuse and Neglect Among Native American/Alaska Native Children: An Analysis of Existing Data. National Indian Child Welfare Association and Casey Family Programs).  I could go on and explain rates of domestic violence in Native American homes (higher), alcohol and other drug abuse rates (higher), and so forth, but you get the picture and this really isn’t the focus of my discussion here.

The point is that we have come a long way toward making this melting pot work and we seem to have stopped that forward progress.  I’m tempted to identify a period in our history when we moved away from the concept of our nation being a soup pot instead of salad bowl as the turning point.  I also think it happened around the time we started talking in terms of political correctness and gender neutrality.

It is no wonder that we cannot seem to attain consensus in the international arena because we can’t seem to find any here at home.  Just look around.  Vegetarians point a judgmental finger at meat-eaters, the LGBT community cries discrimination while those whose moral convictions want to hold onto traditional definitions of marriage.  Pro-choice and pro-life proponents shout each other down. Environmental extremists chain themselves to trees so loggers can’t do their jobs or they spike trees so that when logs go to lumber mills workers are impaled with the spikes that are thrown by the saw blades.  Half of our population wants to impose a greater tax on those who already provide 70% of the nation’s revenues and despise those who were successful in business while the other half of our population stands guard around business and industry.  Many in our country want to send illegal immigrants or undocumented workers or whatever they are called back to the hell holes they came from and then seal the borders air-tight while others want to open the doors to anybody and everybody and give carte blanche amnesty and citizenship to those who came in through the back door.  Then the anti-gun lobby is at odds with the Second Amendment Rights advocates.  Please don’t get me started on racial tensions which are worse now than at any time that I can recall.

It seems to me that as sophisticated as we are and as advanced we are in our knowledge and ability to acquire information that somewhere in the mix there is room for reasonable, calm, respectful, discussion.  Somewhere among all the data we possess are answers.  Surely we have moved to a place in this Twenty-first Century where we can talk in terms of win-win for all those with invested interests.

Perhaps there are issues that everybody can agree upon that can be addressed first before the more difficult challenges are tackled.  Perhaps once we learn how to have productive dialogues with no hidden agendas we could move forward.  This, of course, requires a great deal of trust, meaning that all those who sit at the discussion table must be trustworthy.

Perhaps once we learn how to solve our domestic problems we could move into the international arena.

Perhaps I’m a dreamer.  Perhaps I have too much time on my hands.