Most would agree that we all hope to remain learners our entire lives. The simple guiding principle being that we can always learn something new. So, when I use the phrase “our formative years” placing those words in quotes I am thinking more of our early years: years of innocent youth followed by that mysterious period of adolescence. Those combined years when we form some of the most basic and foundational tenets of character which, in turn, carry us forward into adulthood. We learn skills to communicate, values of life, and models for citizenship. And whether those same basic beliefs are secular or non-secular in origin matters less than the outcomes. Yes, I do think we all wish to remain learners in life. I do also trust that all humans, enhanced by our diversity, endeavor to treat others as they wish to be treated in return. When I think back on “my formative years” I think of certain words and concepts: those of respect, kindness, honesty, fallibility, and leadership. It’s a worthy list to ponder and revisit as we remain life-long learners. But it’s also how we learn to practice these very same beliefs day to day that, perhaps, counts more in life.
For example. Sometime during our formative years, we are exposed to the reality of death. From listening, around the supper table I suppose, I came to understand that one simply did not “speak ill of the dead.” That notion seems both naturally and inherently tied to the belief in the basic respect one human-being owes to another, in both life and in death. Indeed: “Do not speak ill of the dead.” We also learn soon enough that the world has seen evil people who have perpetrated enormous and hideous crimes against their fellow human beings. We do not celebrate their lives, nor their crimes and we hope to, over time, learn from those horrific circumstances which gave rise to great evil. If there ever exists a time or place to “speak ill of the dead” it may be for those few evil and wicked souls. But I am not certain about that at all.
Another example. During the formative years of my own youth, I learned a deep and abiding respect for military veterans. That respect has, if anything, grown over my years. Growing up during the decades immediately after WWII, as children we all knew who those veterans were and many often marched in their uniforms during the small parades on Memorial Day or July 4. Until, one by one, they no longer marched. During the formative days of my adolescence when former schoolmates went to serve in Vietnam, I learned a deeper appreciation of respect. And when three of our own were killed, while doing their duty in Vietnam, I felt a new level of honor and of sadness that cannot be taught in classrooms or in Sunday schools.
Those “formative years” also exposed us to the concept of leadership. Most children first experience comfort and safety in their parents’ care. A hand held firmly crossing the road or a “catch” in the front yard. A quiet bedtime story. I was exposed to team sports where leadership came in the form of a valued teammate or an exceptional coach. The pursuit of athletics, as the Greeks sought to teach humanity, becomes a grand metaphor for life. We learn in history classrooms the true stories of great and successful leaders. Spiritual leaders. Military leaders. Leaders of great social movements and those leaders who simply emerge at times of natural disasters or turmoil. Thankful for our formative years, we then seek and hope to find great leadership in our first jobs. And it makes me often wonder: Can great leadership be learned? Can leadership be taught? Are you born a leader or is great leadership born out of crisis? Is leadership something granted by common vote or trial by fire? Or both? Or is leadership something else entirely?
Here is what I know. I know that to “speak ill of the dead” is wrong. I know that to be openly thankful upon the passing of another human soul is wrong. I know that to be openly and publicly disrespectful to a highly decorated combat war veteran – living or dead - is wrong. I know that to disrespect another person’s decades of public service to one’s country is wrong. And I also know this. I know that our current president is entirely wrong in somehow feeling personally justified in having accomplished all of the above in a single social media post. Three brief sentences. He is wrong in how he has disrespected former Marine Corps Captain Robert Mueller. A man who gave decades in service to the United States both in and out of uniform. This is not leadership.
My intent is not to sermonize. This is not a political or politically motivated essay; although some will insist that it is. They would be wrong. My intent is to recall those few lessons of simple decency that I learned right here in this small Valley during my formative years. Recent events make me even more thankful for those seemingly normal people in my own life who were so very special and formative and solid and decent. One over-riding lesson I learned right at home, again right at the supper table. Wrong is wrong. The current president has been astonishingly disrespectful. Even for him and on too many occasions. And this is entirely wrong.
Graves lives in Warren.
