Well mister I'm not in a hurry
And I don't want to be like you
And all I want from tomorrow
Is to get it better than today
- from "Jacob's Ladder", by Huey Lewis and the News
Someday, I feel like I am sleeping on stones. Other days, like I am buried underneath them. Other days still, I just stub my toes and stumble on through the day.
Then there are the days I notice - hey, that stone's different. Perhaps it is gold, or iron or simply something useful such as rock salt. Perhaps it's just interesting, like shale. Or simply pretty, like mica.
Then there are the stones that stand strong and ready - marble and red granite, the foundations of a better life. It just takes time to find the makings of that better day, time and work to clear a place, to quarry the best in ourselves and our lives and - it takes this too - to find the fellowship of others in our labors, and take comfort that, one, we are not alone and, two, that the greater wisdom and progress comes from working together - first on the foundations, then the structures we raise.
This does not take a single grand plan, adherence to one monolithic vision. It just takes wanting tomorrow to be better than today...and then doing something about it, together.
Don't judge yourself and others by how aligned their words and deeds and images are to your own, and that of the causes you embrace. Judge only this - is today better than the day before? Are you? If not...do something different, today.
Who knows? You might find yourself in a park holding a sign, or at a table in the rain collecting signatures... or sending a friend some funds who, very definitely, needs today to be better than the day before.
And wouldn't it be nice if that sort of general progressive mindset took hold?
I think so. I have some ideas on building a better tomorrow - we all do. There is certainly plenty of work to go around. Plenty of foundations to lay, structures to raise.. and bridges to build. Or in some cases, to rebuild.
Step by step, one by one, as the song goes. I'll see you today... and in that better tomorrow.