Becoming Friends

THEY CAME TOGETHER because they were willing to take a chance, to take a chance on love and reconciliation. Knowing that they were natural adversaries, they came together hoping and believing that they could find something better, could create something better. One group came from Massachusetts, the other from Kentucky. One, liberal, the other conservative. The bleeding heart liberal do gooders fearing the end of the world, wanting to change everything, the other, content with the comfort of long held traditions. Amid all the turmoil and acrimony of our tortured country, they knew there surely must be a better way. Well, it was worth a try. The folks from the north can see climate change in their own neighborhoods, and wonder why not everyone else can. The Kentucky folk, proud in their fundamentalist, patriotic roots, married to their livelihood in the coal mines, turned out to be less unwilling than expected to accept that, yes, the climate is changing, and yes, human beings may be causing some of it. But they know that without their coal industry, they have no hope and no future. Without hope and a future, how can people worry about the climate? Complete strangers, few if any of them had any expectation of success, of coming harmoniously together in love, replacing fear and mistrust with community. And yet, within the human spirit lives something higher, something more precious than mere political differences, and somehow, without anyone knowing or understanding why or how, this higher self emerged. They became friends. They began to understand each other. First, In Kentucky, then, in Massachusetts, they visited, talked, got to know one another. Gradually, the miracle emerged. When they parted company, they resolved to never let their new friendship be severed by petty political concerns, and to always remain friends. The Kentucky people did not want to let their sweet guests from the north go home, but, reluctantly, they parted company. They sill see each other again, they will be together always, and always, they will give the rest of us hope, the hope that if they can do it, so can we. At least we can try.