My tennis partner asked me what I’d written about that week and I told him that I’d written a column about throwing my racket, my 14-year-old granddaughter’s temperate spirit, and Putin’s butchery in that order, and that, somehow, the connections had been made, my hope being that a United States citizenry steadfast like her will ultimately prevail over autocrats, abroad and at home.
Quiescence tends to corrupt and absolute quiescence corrupts absolutely, it seems. As for power, bad people are bound to abuse it absolutely if given free rein by a sheepish populace (see Putin), so I am hoping that our young people will be brought up to believe in themselves, that they will always examine what they’re told with a critical eye — as my wife does — and that they will let their spirits shine to the extent that another grandchild of ours has. He’s the shortest kid on his travel basketball team, but though height-challenged at the moment, he plays with a 6-foot-8 spirit, and his teammates delight in that.
“He sees the court,” his coach says. Or put simply, “He sees.” As does she. Though teenagers, they are exemplars to my mind. I would like to live long enough to see how they, and our seven other grandchildren — about whom undoubtedly I will also write in time — fare in this world where but to think is to be full of sorrow.
As bad as it is, I’m sure they will do their best to make it better. What more can one ask?
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. . . . Throwing rackets in my case, though I’m sure Mary would say that’s not exactly what Ecclesiastes meant.