Then and Now

A couple of days ago a friend of mine was telling me of her heartbreak over the way her teenage daughter treats her.

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These days I count the lady who cleans my house as one of my dearest friends.

Today DH is taking a Russian businessman to lunch

and showing him around as he has an interest in becoming involved financially in this country.

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What have these in common?, you may be thinking -or alternatively: "What the heck has she been smoking!?"

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Here's the thing:

Everything changes.

We all know that

But every now and then it really hits home.

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I remember

being crushed by my own kids' treatment many times.

They were kids and I was the mom.

Its part of the deal

And that's how it works in their world.

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But that was then and this is now -

When my kids are among my greatest joys in life

And their words are often the ones that build me up.

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I remember

when black people seemed to all look the same to me

Because I didn't know them as individuals.

When we didn't and couldn't know them

and all the richness that is in so many of them.

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But that was then and this is now -

When we have found each other

in spite of the politician's efforts to keep enmity and suspicion between us

Now we really *see* each other

And talk and share and laugh together

This is what we were deprived of all those years

But we have it now.

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I remember

a time when every movie villain was a Russian

Don't you?

The Cold War; dreaded KGB; the drab grey settings;

the tortures . .

The locked-in-ness of the Russian people by their Communist oppressors;

the unthinkable restriction of life

and thought and creativity and association.

Seemingly impregnable and eternal.

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But that was then and this is now -

When the Russians are once again persona grata

and are part of the fabric of

the economic system

Their businessmen travel the world -

without secret miniature cameras or pocket nuclear arms.

And here they are, right in my small part of geography,

as if it had been this way forever.

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It helps to think of things in this light

when life is pressing hard.

There is always hope

The seemingly impossible often happens

Just in it's time

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