UNCHARTED WATERS

 The term originally applied to the brave explorers, treasure seekers, and those seeking new homes who sailed, rowed, away from known coastal waters, venturing far across oceans, into uncharted waters. This was when there were believed to be monsters under the waters of the ocean, or even possibly an end to the oceans of the flat earth. Think of the bravery of these people. Think of the power of their motivations - curiosity, greed and even desperation.

Actually, all of life is in uncharted waters. We can plan, we can organize, we can promise, but one never knows what can happen to snafu those plans. Life is uncharted and flexibility, faith in motivation, are necessary to have a sane world. When those uncharted waters turn out to be disastrous for individual or humanity at large, it is time to seek new mapmakers and send them out to chart the unknown and chart honestly for the safety of all.

However, maps have their limitations. Some cannot truly be drawn until experienced, such as space, or the depths of the deepest oceans. There are places remaining unexplored, uncharted and I wonder at times if we are not better off leaving that as the status quo until we know, learn better. 

Unfortunately, we never seem to learn from past mistakes. We scorched the earth with exploration and land grabs from the very beginning of venturing into these waters and have continued right to the very present moment. Nor do I see any chance of this land grab action abating any time soon. Uncharted waters that are deadly to all, yet on we go. A great fear is that as we take more and more steps to explore space and other planets, we will spread human venom and vice throughout the universe, bringing old, should have long ago been discarded ways of thought and deed into blank slate planets or even to previously settled ones with life forms other than what we know. What then?

We need to rebalance ourselves. We need to keep the sense of adventure and progress, but carefully and thoughtfully. We must ensure that we allow for misunderstandings for clashes of culture, for facing the unknown, even as babies learn to balance and step off into the larger world of their home and life. Babies must learn that critical skill of balance if they are to succeed in life. It is when balance of adults is off that we create and maintain a crooked, unbalanced society, one prone to evil and harm, uncaring of and for many, with tragic consequences ensuing. Today, we are so unbalanced that one can almost feel the earth trembling on its axis.

We, today, do not often realize how blessed we are in our lives. Yes, there is economic uncertainty - but when was there ever not? Yes, there is baseless, senseless, violence inspiring hatreds and biases, but at least we are trying to alleviate their harm and hopefully, teach the haters to rebalance. Probably a Sisyphean task, but we must try lest the unbalance of life will try to reset via war in all forms.

As we age, we learn how important balance is. We fight to maintain our own physical balance even as age encroaches on that sought after balance. We finally understand how important life balance is and where we went wrong. We try to pass this understanding on, the better way to explore uncharted waters of life and living, but the younger generations never seem to absorb that understanding, even reject it at times -just as we did not when we were young. Perhaps the sense of some unbalance is necessary if we are to enter uncharted waters demanding entry and exploration. Perhaps. Perhaps not. I just wish we could do at least somewhat better.

In the meanwhile, we must look to and into ourselves and appreciate what we have and how we can make it better for all. Especially those crying out in fear, in desperation, starved, dehydrated, beaten and tortured, calling out to the world from dark dungeons and imprisonment. There is no balance for them; hence, no balance for the rest of us as well. Simply think of America, the world, today and understand the concept of balance and the uncharted waters that remain.

While you are eating your turkey, savoring those yams, waiting with great anticipation for dessert, planning for the family games later and the football games of the afternoon, keep in mind those who cannot do all these things. Think how blessed we are even in the midst of the chaos of life today.

Keep them all in mind.

Think of her - 

 Brittney Griner.

32 years old; 

a mother; 

a wife;

an athlete;

 a person;

persecuted for being American, Black, Gay, woman;

Condemned to a hellish freezing penal prison;

known eyewitness reports of:

torture;

slave labor;

starvation;

 no medical care;

little food;

inadequate clothing;

inadequate shelter;

zero life expectancy;

a plaything caught in a maelstrom of other's creation.

TIME TO BRING HER HOME.

WAY PAST TIME

IT IS UPON US - 

RESCUE THE CAPTIVE

SAVE A LIFE

BRITTNEY GRINER CALLS OUT TO US.

HEAR HER CRIES.

FEEL HER PAIN.

SHE IS US, YOU AND ME 

AND WE ARE HER.