Dr. Chris Gilmer
I never once heard him complain.
My paternal grandfather, “Papaw” as I called him, worked hard, married the love of his life, reared three sons, and died owning the small farm where he toiled most of his life and where I spent the formative moments of my childhood. Sun up to sun down, aged seven to 70, he plowed, and then he plowed some more. We ate bountifully the products of his labor, never hungry, although always poor. While my maternal grandparents never owned the land they farmed, my uncle still lives on that little patch of native soil that Papaw left him.
Like the song writer Jewel says: “I am the product of such sacrifice. I am the accumulation of the dreams of generations, and their stories live in me like holy water.” I cannot write, read, hear, or sing those words without tears forming in my eyes because, better than any other explanation of my being that I have ever heard, she gets me.
Papaw and all the others gave everything so that I could have something, so that I could in his estimation be something more than he was, so that I could earn the right to provide for the next generation. Make no mistake, the right to make sacrifices for others is still an honor, and families are still giving all they have to lift up their children.
Why, I ask, as a society can we not lift up our children together when there is more than enough to sustain and to nurture all of them? Why must only some of them enjoy the promise and the bounty of the American dream?
Why must some of them be deported, racially profiled, even murdered based on their skin color and their heritage? Why must some of them be bullied and vilified for their gender or sexual orientation? Why must females grow up with the reality that they will likely be paid less than males for doing the same job, and in many cases for doing it better? Why must some continue to live in poverty while others live in more than abundance in a nation where wealth is so unevenly and unfairly distributed?
