BlissFullU

I’ve never been one to restrict celebrations to a single day, so I’m continuing my 4th of July series beyond the literal day. Especially after reading the news today, including another mass killing at a 4th of July event and rising unrest after another police shooting of an unarmed Black man, I would like the idealistic energy around our national founding day celebration to last a little longer…

I’m sure that you were like me yesterday, receiving dozens or hundreds of emails during the course of our national holiday. In my case, about 70% of those emails were from commercial entities letting me know about their 4th of July sales (since shopping is apparently the third favorite way Americans celebrate holidays, just behind eating too much of the wrong foods and drinking too much of the wrong beverages). Another 25% were messages from politicians, mostly those who are running for election this year or who are supporting others running for election this year. As much as I try to unsubscribe to political emails, more seem to show up in my mailbox each day. I would just like to say that while I know we are all connected, I have my hands full trying to keep up with the races in North Carolina; I really don’t need daily updates about races in Iowa and Colorado and Minnesota and Texas, as important as I’m sure they are. Finally, there were about 5% that were newsletters or updates or inspirational messages or such from organizations I actually signed up for and support, and even 1 or 2 from–GASP–people I actually know! Such is the nature of email these days.

However, among all of that, there were a few emails that really moved and inspired me. So over the next few days, I’m going to be sharing a few of my favorites. This post is mostly just explaining that before they start showing up.

But the holiday weekend is done and our celebration is officially over. I’ll go back to the work I do every day, which I like to think is making the world a better place for our children and our children’s children (and just to be clear, I mean all the children, not just those to whom we are biologically related). I also like to think that all of us, regardless of party or political preference or race or gender or religion, can all agree on this idea–that we want our world to be safer, healthier, freer, more abundant, more secure for all the children.

Surely we can unite around that, right?