Hope for the future.

So I have this friend. She is young, energetic and extremely active. She plays two different types of sports very well and can play three musical instruments. She loves to write poetry and she reads almost as much as I do and believe me when I say that is an impressive statement. She is also one of the most insightful, intelligent and wise young...Hells any age person I have ever met. She consistently asks questions that make old Geezers like me shake their heads and go, “Whhhaaa?” She is completely unafraid to ask questions and always does her best to comprehend the answers she gets. We lovingly call her MacT© because her parents don't want her real name bandied about the Interwebz.

Today she posted a link to an article Governor Chris Christie's signing on of a ban on “Gay Conversion” Therapy. My buddy Ben gave her a well written response which she partially misunderstood. Once Ben explained himself, she shook her virtual head and said, “Sorry I misunderstood. See I am not nearly as smart as all you say I am. “ I read this and it made me shake my own not so virtual head.

If my friend can be said to have any sort of failing, it is that she seems incapable of seeing just how amazing young people like her are. She sees herself as nothing exceptional and truly doesn't grok why we find her so incredible. So I am going to try to explainate some of the reasons we should be amazed by her and young people like her. (Waves at Susan.)

Let us start with the incredible need to question pretty much every thing around them. Geezers like me and Ben still question things. We look at the world around us and try to grasp WTH has happened. However, we are old and even though we hate to admit it, kind of set in our ways. Some days we can be just as guilty as everyone else of just saying, “Well that is just the way things are and the way they have always been.” That's not pretty (Especially Ben in the altogether. Yikes!), but it happens.

Now along comes the wily MacT© who will innocently ask a question that immediately hits us over the head with a frying pan, steals our wallets and runs off with our cookies. We sit there in stunned silence wondering exactly what just happened. Then we pick up our pants from the floor and try to answer the questions put to us. Way to many people today are afraid to ask questions or speak out when they disagree with something. MacT© and others like her seem to delight in doing it.

More importantly than asking questions, MacT© really wants to know the answers to those questions, even if she doesn't really like them. A lot of people ask questions, but only listen to the answers that fit their world view. Anything else gets circular filed and deleted at the first available opportunity. Young people like my friend listen to the answers they get and if they don't like them, they try to change them.

Being smart doesn't mean that you know everything. Being smart doesn't mean you have all the answers. Being smart and being wise means trying to find the answers and fit them into the world around you. Way to many people just accept and move on, never wondering why things are the way they are or where the whole thing is going. They listen to Faux News or the Communist News Network to all the pretty sound bites and believe that is all there is to the story. The truly smart and wise study all the aspects of everything and then form their own opinions.

Our country, hells our world is truly messed up. We have wars all over the globe where hundreds die everyday. We have people starving to death just hundreds of miles away from cities where there is plenty for all. We have people dying of diseases that can be treated with a simple injection because the vaccines cost far more than they can pay. We need to change, not just on a national level but on a global level and the only way we are going to change is if people step up and start making those changes happen.

I see news articles all the time of the brilliance and wisdom of the current young generation and it gives me hope. Hope that maybe some of the problems confronting us can be solved. It is not fair to put the job of fixing this disaster on the shoulders of our kids, but at least I see proof that some of them might be up to the job. Most of the older generations, even the ones who truly want to change things, are to complacent and fearful of the changes needed to do anything. The answers have to lie in MacT© and her fellows. I see them and I have hope.

Brew Long and Prosper