Ramblings in Newport News Park (2/3/2015)

This morning I had the rare opportunity to take the dogs on a sunrise walk.  It was the result of a major screw up from my side.  The evening before I had opened the trunk of my car to put my little lunch bag in the trunk and somehow my keys had fallen in my bag and I had not noticed.  When I closed the trunk, I was locked out.  So I was standing in the parking garage, upset and completely disgusted with myself.  There is just too much stress where I work, and it does not look like things will lighten up soon.  Not knowing what to do, it felt like it would be cheaper to have my wife come all the way from home to save me as opposed to paying someone to unlock my car.  It may have been a mistake to do that, but we got a nice dinner out of it (we went out to dinner at Pasture, which is rapidly becoming one of my more favorite places to eat in downtown Richmond).  Oh well, we decided to sleep late and I would take the dog walking duties.

So back to my walk.  The sun was coming up and yes, since the earth is round, the top of the trees were the first ones being hit by the sun.  They were a fiery gold color.  This reminded me of a saying we have in Dutch: “hoge bomen vangen veel wind”, or translated “tall trees catch a lot of wind.”  Here I could say “tall trees catch the first rays.” 

Oh well, the Dutch saying is used to remind us that famous and important people receive all the scrutiny.  We can see that with the paparazzi and movie stars, or even politicians.  It all came together at that moment.  I had just watched a little thing on the CBS morning news how the Republican candidates for president were all pro-choice, at least when it came to vaccinating their children.  Honestly, who cares, but obviously they are the tall trees now and will get a lot of wind.  I’m not really looking forward to another political season.  It seems we are always in election mode.

But there is a deeper issue here, as well.  The important thing I’m learning over and over is that as a society we don’t care any longer about what the experts say and what the scientists and specialists have discovered; whether it is vaccinations or global warming.  And, the politicians just go along with them, they are catering to the lowest common denominator.