THE BEAT POST


By Melanie K. Wooten
hardcas@mchsi.com

When I was a child I was told that there should be a place for everything, and everything should be put in its place. The concept is not difficult to understand so we learned to take stock of our ‘things’ and have a place for each and every ‘thing’ we possessed. Then, we were shipped off to school where, if we were lucky, we learned about our capitalistic society and the fact that our society is based on supply and demand: I have goods or services to sell and you wish to buy those goods or services. It was an extension of the same concept of “A place for everything and everything in its place”, and it worked quite well for many years.

If you zoom forward to our present society, we face the horrible prospect that there may be no way for our grandchildren to earn a decent living in the united States of America in order to have even the basics we were taught to believe were to be ours: a home, a family, a reliable means of getting from our home to a job that would provide the income to purchase the home. There has been much confusion over this situation and what brought it about, but if you return to the idea of “A Place for Everything”, you are stunned by the simplicity of our plight: There is no place for everyone!

The greatest component of this decline in job quality and quantity was birth control and/or abortion. We have only to look at the European nations and see that they are comprised of aging populations, without replacements, much less increasing in population after the devastation of the two World Wars. The major economic powers in the modern world have found themselves inundated with immigrants from the alleged Third World countries who, with the exception of China, have no bars to reproduction, but since these countries are unable to feed, clothe and care for their ever-burgeoning populations, immigration is encouraged and even undertaken illegally in order to achieve a better life for the immigrants and their families in an industrialized nation.

The other component in this problem was the business owner who saw a chance to lower costs through hiring individuals who would not demand a better life than those working around him/her in the industrialized nations because any job in those nations, paying any amount of money, was better than what was left behind in the Third World countries! At the same time this situation was becoming a political issue in Europe, America launched into an era of so-called social responsibility requiring medical care, low-cost housing, etc., be provided to those less fortunate, which would not have been an overwhelming burden were it not for the influx of people who work for less money and no benefits.

The inequity of this situation is readily apparent when those earning no money and/or paying no taxes receive services not available to or affordable by those footing the bill for the free medical care because of the horrendous tax bill required to pay for the services provided to those not paying the taxes! The old adage of supply and demand has continued to operate in a downward spiral so that those investing much time, effort and money in qualifying for these high-paying jobs, in reasonable expectation of receiving a well-paying position as a return on their investment, find themselves competing for the jobs with those who had recently arrived to our shores, in some instances, but having access to the goods at reduced rates and services at no expense! These same non-citizens are provided preferential access to the education that would provide Americans with the better jobs and better pay, thereby further eroding the tax base.

The irony of not competing with other Americans for these jobs has become a distinct reality because of our own selfishness in opting for abortion as a method of individual success, rather than the success of our society, which formerly put great value on a single life --- just take a look at what was called “The Garden of the Lambs” in cemeteries from another time. Those tiny children, some with “Baby Girl” or “Baby Boy” for their names, were buried with great care and beneath a stone costing many months’ income declaring their place in the lives of their families. Now, we don’t even want to know what happens to all the lives cut short in the name of vanity or convenience; we don’t even care enough to personalize their “burials”.

The American Indian, the former occupant of most of these united States, believed that the circle was sacred. Their tepees were circular; they were put in a circle when pitched and to this day, this practice continues.


Black Elk

Black Elk, a holy man of the Oglala Sioux, who was baptized Christian, found his place in both worlds, and wrote a book, Black Elk Speaks, wherein he states:

"Then I was standing on the highest mountain of them all, and round about

beneath me was the whole hoop of the world. And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being.

"And I say the sacred hoop of my people was one of the many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy... "But anywhere is the center of the world."

If we do not return to this simplicity of life and belief, we are a doomed people. We must put God at the center of our individual circle, which as Black Elk says, “. . . anywhere is the center of the world.” To quote the Night Prayer of Black Elk, which I said every day I worked before I started my day and was under the plasticine blotter on my desk:

Grandfather, great mysterious one, you have always been, and before you nothing has been. There is nothing to pray to but you. The star nations all over the universe are yours, andyours are the grasses of the earth.

You are older than all need, older than all pain and prayer.Grandfather, all over the world the faces of living ones are alike. In tenderness they have come up out of the ground.

Look upon your children with children in their arms, that they may face the winds and walk the good road to the day of quiet.

Teach me to walk the soft earth, a relative to all that live. Sweeten my heart, and fill me with light. Give me strength to understand and the eyes to see.

Help me, for without you I am nothing.

Black Elk was a Sioux Indian and this prayer was
translated from his book of thoughts,

circa 1832. If Black Elk’s concept of God is
primitive, we should all be so primitive.

(As is with many cultures, there is no word for God so the title
of greatest respect was used, “Grandfather”.)

TWO WOLVES

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us all.

"One is Evil - It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

"The other is Good - It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

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