Hope Is a Choice

 By Marilyn Moore

Did your family have a designated family worrier?  Mine did, or at least, that’s how I saw it.  It was Aunt Marie, my mom’s sister, the oldest of the six siblings.  Aunt Marie kept track of everyone, which was mostly wonderful, because we all knew she was looking out for us.  She knew who was ill, who was hurting, who was getting married, who was having a baby, whose car had broken down, who had a new job and who needed a new job, whose crops were doing well and whose were faltering.  She knew it all….and if there were a reason to worry, Aunt Marie did so.  She also stepped in to help, anyone on the above list or anyone else who might just need a little boost.

When Aunt Marie died, my mom took over that role.  I don’t think it weighed her down; for her it was a part of caretaking.  Somehow or other, she just knew…who needed help, who needed prayers, who needed a phone call or a visit or a card or a plate of cookies or tomatoes from her garden.  

My mom was the last of her siblings to die, and I don’t think a member of my generation has stepped into that role…though perhaps one of the cousins has done so.  While I’m not the family worrier, I do notice that I tend to worry about “things” more than I did ten years ago.  Perhaps when I was working there simply was not time to notice all the things that could go wrong; now, I seem to have more time for worry. 

I think there’s a negative connotation to the word “worry,” and I tend to not use it, choosing words like “fret” or “concern.”  Not sure there’s much difference….I envy my friend Mary, whose approach to “things that go wrong” is intentionally thinking, “It’s probably just something little, something easily fixed.”  Mine is exactly the opposite.  

I can go in thirty seconds from a leaky pipe that means a part of a ceiling will need to be replaced to a leaky pipe that means the entire second floor will collapse into the first place and the house will be destroyed.  I can go in thirty seconds from a growth on my eyelid that my ophthalmologist assures me is non-cancerous and easily removed to a malignancy that has penetrated my eye and will cause permanent blindness.  I can go in thirty seconds from being a week past the oil change date on my car to total engine failure.  And all of these are magnified twenty-fold when it’s two o’clock in the morning.  Eventually, reason takes over, I get more information and make a plan of action, and the thing about which I’ve been fretting (for days or weeks or longer) is resolved, and it moves off my 2 a.m. worry list. 

(I do not downplay the seriousness of some of these reasons for worry, either for myself or others. I’ve received the phone call telling me I had cancer; somehow, I never thought I would hear my name and the word “cancer” in the same sentence, but it happened, and it’s happened to many of my friends, too.  I’ve known people whose homes were destroyed, who literally started over.  I was with my mom when she got the phone call in the middle of the night that my dad had died, and I know others who have experienced the same.  The death of a child is a parent’s worst nightmare; it’s happened to people I know and love.  Sometimes, the things we worry about do happen, and it’s awful….and worrying didn’t help….but how can you not.)

More recently, I’ve been worried about our country, about the institutions that are intended to be the bedrocks of our democracy, institutions like free and fair elections, voting rights, balance of powers among three branches, equality before the law, freedom to speak and protest and petition, due process, birthright citizenship.  These are big things, and big worries…way more than a leaky pipe and an oil change. Big enough that it’s hard to figure out what one person might do….and wearying to think about the effort it takes to combine the efforts of the millions of people who are also worried, also fretting.  

And then, Michelle Obama, in her magnificent speech at the opening of the Obama Presidential Center, addressed it head on.  We have choices.  Her words: 

And that's why, folks, we simply don't have the luxury or time to be cynical or complacent, to wring our hands in despair, to wait for someone else to fix the problem.

Y'all, hope is all we have.

Because hope is the essential spark that lights the fire of change. But hope is a choice. Whether or not we use our voices to speak up is a choice. Voting is a choice. Being a decent human being is a choice. Believing that we still hold the power to build a country that reflects us all is a choice.

So, whether it’s a leaky pipe, a hard medical diagnosis, or an assault on a democratic value, we have choices.  I have a choice.  And the choice is to figure out what action one person can take that makes the desired outcome more likely rather than less likely.  As for the assaults on democracy, I can choose to vote.  To speak. To write.  To contact members of congress.  To campaign for candidates who reflect my deeply held values.  To support financially those agencies that support, defend, and advocate for those who are threatened and intimidated.  Those are not glamorous acts, but they are acts of citizenship.  When enough of us do them, we move the needle in the right direction…we bend the arc toward justice.

And when I’m tired of worrying, I read again the words of Mary Oliver, author of, “I Worried.”

I worried a lot.  Will the garden grow, will the rivers flow in the right direction, will the earth turn

as it was taught, and if not how shall 

I correct it?

Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven,

can I do better?

Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows

can do it and I am, well,

hopeless.

Is my eyesight fading or am I just imagining it,

am I going to get rheumatism,

lockjaw, dementia?

Finally I saw that worrying had come to nothing.

And I gave it up.  And took my old body

and went out into the morning,

and sang.

                    Mary Oliver    

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