In previous posts, I looked at what I’d want to happen if I were writing my life’s story, and what the situation is now, to get a clue about what I should write next. And what I saw is that I can only write the next few minutes about what my part is, what my main character, Rand, will try to do. So a better question is, who should he be? What should his character be like?

Honorable

If I were writing the story of who I am, I think I’d make the character honorable. He might make mistakes at times. When my wife is upset and doesn’t want to talk with me, should I insist on talking to her? Or should I make the hard decisions myself? The path isn’t always clear. And more than occasionally, people are disappointed, even yelling! It’s not always easy to see the honorable course of action from the middle of life’s drama.

But I want to write a story about a hero. Someone who did his best to make it all work out. And at each step, he did what he could to handle everything. He made some sacrifices at times. Even with his health and his family and his finances, and even with delivering PeopleCount. I’d have to write that he had lots and lots of failures. He tried not to break his promises, but he could rarely keep them. He tried not to make impossible promises, but they seemed possible.

Courage

I’d want him to be courageous. Everyone has fear. Courage is acting in spite of it. I’d want him to be an adult about his emotions. He would make a priority of doing the right thing.

And when he broke his promises, he’d own up to it. Even if he couldn’t keep his word, he’d honor it. And sometimes he failed to keep his word because he was frail or weak or a really good reason would come along. When he realized that, he’d reprioritize and clean it up as best he can.

Even when things didn’t work out, over and over and over again, he did what he could, what he knew to do, what he saw to do. And he asked people as best he could for what he needed. He got a ton of rejection.

What Story of our Future shall we Write?

I think I’d write that he was self aware. That he know that he was the author of his life. He kept going back to the question of, how do we want to write the story of our future?

Clearly, the story of the past is that a healthy political system didn’t happen. Things in America got worse and worse and worse. Economic problems, endless war, a really lousy health care system, and a completely dysfunctional party system and government. What was possible happened. We can’t look there for guidance- that’ll just lead to more of the same…

What shall we write next?

What stands between us and a country we can be proud of?
What stands between us and a government we believe in?
What stands between us and a political system we believe in?

It’s mostly our cynicism. Please, give that up and join me and Rand, my character. We can make a system that works.

Seriously. We can. Please put your name on our announcement list and donate a few dollars.