Hope in the darkness before the dawn…

Hope. What a necessary virtue these days. According to the interwebs, hope is a strength taking in the motivation and confidence that goals can be reached. We all may have different hopes, but the virtue itself is light. 

I hope the highway gets completely striped before the weekend and next year it is done in May. 

I hope the two teenagers who vandalized the new turf field with the image of a penis (banal adolescent humor) and a swastika (waaaay over the boundaries of any adolescent humor) understand why the community was up in arms over their action! I hope they are taught lessons in appropriate boundaries, and that actions have consequences.

I hope people stop pooping in the nearby woods and if they absolutely must, they bury it or take it out themselves. 

I hope our valley continues to avoid a major wildfire and hope we get a monsoon rains in August instead of a monsoon sprinkles. 

I hope the Forest Queen ends up as good and deep as the time spent renovating it. 

I hope former Crested Buttian Phillip Supino’s idea to reinvigorate mountain town culture through an out-of-the-box housing idea as described in Tuesday’s Colorado Sun, works.

Something to keep in mind with the big picture chaos happening around the country is that it’s always darkest before the dawn. But holy cow, when does the sun come up this time of year?

While you might think the militarization of law enforcement in our nation’s capital, making it into a federal police state because of a made-up “emergency” (violent crime in D.C. reached historic 30-year lows last year and is down another 26% so far this year) won’t happen here, it can. ICE on Elk Avenue! It’s probably not something to worry too deeply about in our CB bubble but there is reason to stay awake and aware since Denver is always brought up as a problem city. And if military policing is happening to our fellow citizens in D.C. or Denver or Chicago, it is happening to us.

 If you think the idea of eliminating habeas corpus that allows anyone to challenge a government detention won’t happen to you because you aren’t an illegal immigrant, riddle me this — how do you prove you aren’t a so-called ‘illegal’ if the masked men throw you in the unmarked van, even by accident or because you once questioned Donald’s morals? You don’t — you just get disappeared to this area’s version of Alligator Alcatraz — the Gothic Gulag. 

Taking actions that make people fear the government is part of the template used to bring about the rise of an authoritarian or an authoritarian government. Personally, I’m less concerned about Donald who seems an increasingly confused actor (hello Joe!) in a central TV role, and more about the dark snakes like Stephen Miller, Russell Vought, JD Vance and Peter Thiel. Pay attention to that production team as the drama series unfolds.

But there is always hope…

At a reception this week for the final CB Public Policy Forum, speaker Daniel Weiner of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law said Crested Butte was too pretty a place to begin his talk with a ‘woe is us’ attitude…impressive since the title of his Tuesday talk was “American Democracy in Crisis: Big Challenges and the Path Forward.” He said while there are certainly big tests with America’s current situation, he is hopeful the country can survive the challenges, and the pendulum will swing back to center. He did note more than once that many of the woeful issues in the spotlight are part of both partisan sides of the political spectrum and some rethinking of our system is probably in order. Fair.

I walked over to the “Flags on Intention” exhibit on the Gothic Field fence on Monday. Very cool. Hundreds of flags flapping in the afternoon breeze were setting ideas of hope free on the North Valley winds. You could not only see the ideas but hear them.

“Love,” “Kindness is Key” and “Explore the world, see its beauty” are just a few of the thoughts originating from the locally-made flags that are now blowing around the valley. Those intentions and scores of other hopeful thoughts are a nice August respite from the national political gloom too many people seem mired in. Go by the colorful flag exhibit and take a break from the negativity. Hope that the pendulum will begin swinging back to center.  

Former Arizona Senator John McCain would sometimes say, “It’s always darkest…before it turns pitch black.” Let’s hope he’s wrong with that sentiment for the existing situation — and keep hoping for a new dawn to begin…soon.

—Mark Reaman