I wanted to keep going as if the election didn't affect me. I wanted to just keep loving and living. I wanted to take a page from Anne Frank, and believe the best in people. But that's not what's needed.
What's needed is stark truth.
Our stock market has closed higher than ever this week, but there is a young child sitting at a rickety table in the middle of a tiny apartment who will not eat this morning before school.
The leaders of our nation speak of what the United States of America once was, and what it should be, and what it can be, but there is a man who fought valiantly in Vietnam who will sleep on the pavement of Tremont Street tonight. He has nowhere to live, his country has abandoned him, he screams with the torture of PTSD every night, and his addiction to alcohol keeps him out of every hostel and shelter.
We talk in our comfortable living rooms, CNN blaring, about how the world needs to be a better place, that people need to love each other more, but when someone asked you for a dollar to buy a coffee this morning, you passed by as if they didn't exist, angrily muttering "They'll only spend it on drugs."
My family here in the United States hasn't been here very long, less than 100 years. When they came to this country, people they didn't know lifted them up, gave them a job, turned a blind eye to status or ethnicity long enough for them to make a few dollars and start their citizenship process. My grandfather and his dad slept in the basement of an apartment building in the North End. They could stay there as long as they kept the furnace going. My grandfathers and uncles fought for this country, my grandmothers and aunts suffered great hardship and did their part in keeping our country's economy going; they were factory workers, maids, and secretaries. They worked in factories and scrubbed floors into late life, never asking for a thing except a safe place in which to raise their children. My family taught their children that the United States was an incredible place to live, the very best, and that loyalty to it was of the utmost importance. They fled fascism and dictatorship to be here. How would they be treated today, in this United States of 2016? Would they be called "micks" and "wops", as easily as the words "spics", "towelheads", and "gooks" escape some lips now? Would they be tormented for wearing mantillas on their heads to attend Mass, as people mock women in hijabs now? Would their heads hang a little lower as people hear them speak in accented voices, and yell at them: "You're in America; speak American!"
I can hear some of you now: "Are we running a country, or a charity?" "Why should I have to help anyone else besides myself?" "Why can't people just pick themselves up without help from others, or from the government?" My answers are we are running a community, of law and of charity, of good things for all. We should help because our hearts and brains tell us that it is what must be done. People have different strengths and abilities, and people CAN pick themselves up, but they may sometimes need help. Help them, and they will one day help you.
I will no longer try to simply wish all things be fair and equal. I will fight for it. I will fight for EACH and EVERY person's right to live a life of freedom, a life free from fear, a life where they will have what they need. I will not just do this with words. Words are too simple. I will do this with action, with time, with whatever small amounts of money I can spare, and with a voice that will not be silenced.
As a nation and as a species, we have a duty: to REMEMBER WHERE WE COME FROM, REMEMBER OUR OWN FAMILY HISTORY, and act accordingly. Many think we've lost, that we are no longer capable.
But why can't we?
