Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, January 18, 1993 TAG: 9301160261
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
A BMW ISN'T WORTH A LIFE
IN HER NEW YORK TIMES best-seller Edelman offers her three sons - and all the nation's children - counsel about how to live a moral, compassionate life. This is the second 10 of the 20 "lessons."
Lesson 11: Sell the shadow for the substance. Don't confuse style with substance; don't confuse political charm or rhetoric with decency or sound policy. I have found it wonderful to go to the White House or Congress or to the State House for a chat, but I remind myself at these times that words and schmoozing alone do not meet children's or the nation's needs. Political leadership and different budget priorities do. Speak truth to power. And put your own money and leadership behind rhetoric about concern for families and children in your own homes, classrooms, law firms, medical practices, corporations, or wherever you pursue your career. There's nothing wrong with wanting a BMW or nice clothes. But BMW is not an advanced degree and a designer coat or jacket is not a life goal or worth a life.
I was watching one of President Johnson's inaugural balls on television with a black college president's wife in Mississippi when Mrs. Hamer, that great lady of the Mississippi civil-rights movement who lacked a college degree, but certainly not intelligence or clear purpose, came onto the screen. The college president's wife moaned: "Oh my, there's Miz Hamer at the president's ball and she doesn't even have on a long dress." My response was: "That's all right. Mrs. Hamer with no long gown is there and you and I with our long gowns are not."
\ Lesson 12: Never give up. Never think life is not worth living. I don't care how hard it gets. An old proverb reminds: "When you get to your wit's end, remember that God lives there." Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote that when you get into a "tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn." Hang in with life. Hang in for what you believe is right even if every other soul is going a different way. Don't give in to cynicism or despair or dismiss as unsolvable the great challenges of peace or nuclear survival, racial division, poverty and environmental devastation.
\ Lesson 13: Be confident that you can make a difference. Don't get overwhelmed. Sometimes when I get frantic about all I have to do and spin my wheels, I try to recall Carlyle's advice: "Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand." Try to take each day and each task as they come, breaking them down into manageable pieces for action while struggling to see the whole. And don't think you have to "win" immediately or even at all to make a difference.
And do not think that you have to make big waves in order to contribute. My role model, Sojourner Truth, slave woman, could neither read nor write but could not stand slavery and second-class treatment of women. One day during an anti-slavery speech she was heckled by an old man. "Old woman, do you think that your talk about slavery does any good? Why, I don't care any more for your talk than I do for the bite of a flea." "Perhaps not, but the Lord willing, I'll keep you scratching," she replied.
\ Lesson 14: Don't ever stop learning and improving your mind or you're going to get left behind. The world is changing like a kaleidoscope right before our eyes. College pays and is a fine investment. It doubles your chance of getting a job over a high school graduate. But don't think you can park there or relegate your mind's and soul's growth to what you have learned or will learn at school. Read. Not just what you have to read for class or work, but to learn from the wisdom and joys and mistakes of others. No time is ever wasted if you have a book along as a companion.
\ Lesson 15: Don't be afraid of hard work or of teaching your children to work. Work is dignity and caring and the foundation for a life with meaning. For all her great accomplishments, Mary McLeod Bethune never forgot the importance of practical work. When asked by a train conductor, "Auntie, do you know how to cook good biscuits?" she responded, "Sir, I am an advisor to presidents, the founder of an accredited four-year college, a nationally known leader of women, and founder of the National Council of Negro Women. And yes, I also cook good biscuits."
\ Lesson 16: "Slow Down and Live" is an African song I sing inside my head when I begin flitting around like a hen with her head wrung off: "Brother slow down and live, brother slow down and live, brother slow down and live, you've got a long way to go. Brothers love one another, brothers love one another, brothers love one another, you've got a long way to go."
\ Lesson 17: Choose your friends carefully. Stay out of the fast lane, and ignore the crowd. You were born God's original. Try not to become someone's copy. Benjamin Mays used to tell Morehouse and Spelman College students not to give into peer pressure, saying, "Nobody is wise enough, nobody is good enough, and nobody cares enough for you to turn over to them your future and your destiny." You are the person you must compete with and be accountable for.
\ Lesson 18: Be a can-do, will-try person. Focus on what you have and not what you don't have, what you can do rather than what you cannot do. America is being paralyzed by can't-doers with puny vision and punier will. If the Soviet people and their extraordinary leader Mikhail Gorbachev could dismantle communism, can't we in America envision and wage an end to child neglect, poverty, and family disintegration, which are graver threats to our national future than nuclear weapons?
\ Lesson 19: Try to live in the present; don't carry around unnecessary burdens from a yesterday you will not live again or a tomorrow that is not guaranteed.
\ Lesson 20: Use your political and economic power for the community and others less fortunate. Vote and hold those you vote for accountable. Only 36 percent of young people under 25 voted in the 1988 presidential election. Fewer than 60 percent of women and 52 percent of blacks used their voting power in 1990. We get the political leaders we deserve. America's children and future are too important to leave to politicians elected by so few. Universal Press Syndicate