Love and Limes

In the empire of the senses
You’re the queen of all you survey
All the cities all the nation
Everything that falls your way
There is a deeper world than this
That you don’t understand
There is a deeper world that this
Tugging at your hand
Every ripple on the ocean
Every leaf on every tree
Every sand dune in the desert
Every power we never see
There is a deeper wave than this
Swelling in the world
— Sting, Love Is the Seventh Wave

We’re aware of the hate-mongers pitching their mantra of fear and scarcity and race theory. We’re aware of wars and desperation and greed even as we wake in relative peace, paying for the sins of the world with higher supply chain prices and a distinct and distressing shortage of limes due to climate change and drug cartels playing games. What are we to do in this scenario? Hoard? Buy more ammunition and higher fences?

Maybe the answer is to be better ambassadors of truth and understanding. To embrace our community, warts and all, and make something of it. To go out into the world and embrace cultures distinctly different from our own and show them that we’re not as bad as what they’ve heard about us either. Maybe we ought to double down on love and respect.

The carefully curated news washes over us, wave after unrelenting wave. We either accept their view of the world or we make one of our own. They say that the seventh wave is the largest of all, the one that surfers seek out and sailors watch out for. We might think of it as the wave that will wipe us all out or the wave that will wash away all the madness in the world. I guess the answer lies in which wave has the most mass and momentum as it heads for the beach.

Creative optimism and a healthy dose of love ought to trump hate and madness. When life gives you lemons make lemonade. When it gives you limes make margaritas. But let’s stop all this bickering and enjoy a drink together. For we have work to do.