Sunday, November 3, 2024

THE HOUR THAT WAS

  One hour. 60 minutes. 36,000 seconds. Imagine what could have been accomplished in that one hour. Yes, I know we actually gained an hour, but it feels as if I, we, lost an hour. What could have been accomplished in that one hour. As I look back over the year, I think what could I, should I, have done if I had been given all the time of that one hour, with permission to do anything within its bounds. Think about what you would have done if you had been gifted that treasure. One. hour. A great responsibility. Unlike the fisherman's wife who wasted her three wishes, we cannot afford that error. Each change, each direction taken, must be thought out carefully. In addition, this is not an endless hour. Once those 36,000 seconds are used up, spent by the ticking of the clock, there are no more second chances. No ability to go back, erase and redo.

I am sure that each and every one of us have some very similar wishes. The temptation to make some grandiose wish is very clear, sharp, and dominant. Think about it. What good would it do if you wish to be the richest person even as the world remains in this very precarious state of being. You might have asked, understandably so, for peace to reign.  Think of that peace. Would it be an imposed peace wherein all dissent and opposition are suppressed, and punished? Would it be a peace of understanding? A mutually shared idea of peace and the benefits of peace. Wishes and dreams and thoughts must be extremely explicit lest they be twisted and turned into something completely other than what one wished for or had in mind.

Perhaps selfishly, though I am sure the fulfillment of this desire would actually benefit the world as a whole, would be the cancelation. of the death of my grandson Yitzy. He had so much beauty, talent and promise. Think of what his life, continued on his same unbelievably beautiful track, could have, would have, meant for our very troubled world. If at the age of 13 he had accomplished so much, how much more could have been accomplished had he   lived in multiples of those 13 years. To be honest, even though there is a wider consequence of benefit via cancelation of his death, my main purpose would be to eliminate this constant ache in our hearts and the empty space between. our arms meant to hug him and hold him tight. 

 What else would I have attempted to accomplish during this gift of an hour? That too is simple. Clear as day. I would have canceled October 7,2023. The screams of terror and pain. The raucous raspy sounds of bloodlust, of people who have forgotten humanity, who instead indulged and wallowed in the basest of all instincts and desires. The horrific consequences of that day - think of it. The lives lost on all sides of this conflict. The waste of the creativity of the human brain. Of the potential of our potentiality. Of all that could have been built with the. money and materials funneled into Gaza, so that instead of building tools and weapons and paths of destruction, tools and paths to resurrection and rebuilding and prosperity and peace could have been engendered instead. Why do we humans continue to pour our resources always into the wrong places and to the wrong ideas? And then wonder at the horror we have created. Here is a more definitive wish. There will never be another October 7. 2023. Not in any shape. Not in any way. Not in any form. Not in any desire. Not in any actualization.

In order to make that an actual reality, another act of that hour would be to somehow defray and discard, actually prevent any reasons for the bloody enmity amongst the people who live in that region. Somewhere, somehow, there must be people of Solomonic wisdom who can clearly see the way through the morass of the bog in which we now find ourselves. They see the possibilities of missteps, the traps awaiting, and they avoid them. And along with them comes the multitudes of hordes of people who desire not blame, not a bloody future, but a peaceful future, one with hope for their children. Unfortunately, as part of this wish and its realization, the distorted minds of many will have to be reformatted. Brain cells of hate and anger and bloodlust would be disappeared. Humanity within all would prevail. 

Ha, is the cynical following thought. If wishes were those proverbial horses, we would have a mammoth herd thundering over the plains of the Earth. But instead of those horses of peace we have the thundering boots of human beings marching off to war. So instead of wishing for this nebulous and false and shallow peace, we must dig and delve deep within and make great strides and efforts to achieve real, true peace. Of and for the world and   the soul. Would that I have the power to make this so.

Is there time within this hour for yet another wish? A little, perhaps grandiose puff of wind into the air? I certainly hope so, but this wish would entail the opening of eyes and minds. The growth of understanding of human beings as to the harm we have done to our environment, how we have endangered ourselves to the point of almost existential end. Could that actually happen? Think of it. Our little orb spinning through space, rebirthed, gifted with life, reformatted for a promising future. It is a dream of beauty. It is a dream of life. And unfortunately, at present, it's a dream of futility. But maybe, maybe in the magic of that one hour, maybe....

In the waning settings of that gifted hour, I would address my selfishness. I would wish not for obscene amounts of money but enough so that I could ease the lives of my children and my grandchildren and my great grandchildren. Lives of friends and family would be better. In fact, the lives of all the peoples of this earth would be better. for one cannot pull oneself out of the crowd of humanity that lives upon the surface of this planet. It's simply impossible. 

I would love to buy my house of dreams here. I would love to buy my house of dreams in Israel. I would love to have a mammoth private library in my homed with beautiful wooden sliding ladders and platform upon which stand. as I seek a   favorite book or two. Very selfishly, even as I wish for the cure to the myriad diseases which plague humanity, I would wish for an end to those which plague me in particular. Think of that. The boulder of Sisyphean weight now pressing me down       would be lifted. While that is of little matter or import to the world at large, it is of great import in my own little universe.

Back to reality. Unfortunately, the gift magical imaginary thinking withers and dries up by the time we hit adulthood. In fact, by that time there was very little of it left. Would that we would be able to keep some of it. To pluck it from within the swamp where it is drowning and breathe new life into it. New uses, inspired by possibilities. Would that humanity even without that magical wishful thinking, actually attempt to bring about the changes that are possible. One hour of time. One hour of magic. Millions of years and lives benefited.

If only. What a waste we have made of the gift of creation of man and its myriad possibilities. Instead of a world of beauty and benefit to all, we have created a world of shattered glass and broken cement. Heaps of fragments of what could have been, what should have been, what would have been if only we had paid more attention. If only we had followed all threads of possibilities through to the end and acted accordingly. But instead of building and rebuilding in a positive manner, we destroyed our habitats. and those sharp edge fragments shredded our dreams.

Dear God, one hour. One measly little hour.

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