By: Benjamin Lawrence Bradley
This holiday season, I look around and see endless good things that we can experience only in this world. Friends to love and people to meet. Each of us unique; every one of us one-of-a-kind.
We live in a world where we can eat good food and experience good days. At a time of so much uncertainty, when our respective generations are rocked by plague and famine and war, we live in a land of milk and honey. We have ourselves and we have each other.
We all have hard times and easy times. Each of us is a yin and yang of good and bad experiences. We hear that it is bad and getting worse, but that is only a half-truth. It is also good and getting better. This life is for living. For finding the good and embracing it.
I try to imagine living a hundred or however-many years ago. I see core joys perpetuated through the decades. Family. Love. Success.
We’ve got that and Wi-Fi.
I think about humankind and ponder what blessing I would wish upon us all to find comfort in the spirit of the season. We are surrounded by beautiful people who are each a blessing to increase the good in this world. I would that we may be made capable of considering the good things we want, and view clearly the paths to make them happen for ourselves and one another.
Nowadays when my anxieties arise, I will notice myself not breathing. I take a deep breath to calm myself and consider that I may have finally come to understand that perhaps the secret to life is to simply keep breathing. Some things may get worse, yet we will continue to breathe because the worth of this life is in the things that are good, and the goodness that just keeps getting better.
This holiday, as we share a Merry Christmas, may we all consider, as an 8-billion-member family, that there is goodness to be had, and it is ours for the taking.
By: Benjamin Lawrence Bradley
Executive Director Keep Athens-Limestone Beautiful
December 20, 2024
