A topic that seems a little less Washington political but still political none the less is aging.  In this day in age with Botox and collagen, and the ability to look like a Barbie doll, is aging beautiful and acceptable, or does a person wake up one day is “over the hill” so to speak.   I was looking at my Facebook news feed and saw this article 4 Sisters Take Their Photo Every Year For 36 Years and then went to the Fraenkel Gallery website that has some of the photos of the sister at the photographer Nicholas Nixon’s page.  What these pictures asked me is this, is there a beauty in getting older?  Does age really bring beauty and wisdom?  I know that I wouldn’t want to be 22 again.  These women have allowed their aging process to be put on display for the entire world, and what does it show?  It shows, to me, the real beauty in aging.  That we are a composite of all the moments in our life.  We don’t wake up and suddenly we are old.  We are all human and we should allow ourselves the beauty of that condition.  Recently there has been a horrible loss at our company, a coworker of mine has loss his child, and I am trying to imagine the grief he is going through and I can’t.  All I can think about is the fragility of life.  And maybe that is the place this post is coming from.  I am grateful for my years, all 28 of them.  I know that I easily could not be here.  And I think we should all celebrate our years, even if we are a little ashamed to admit them.

I know that I am dating myself with this post but I don’t care.  I remember 9/11, I remember being 16 years old, in the 11th grade in my algebra 2 class hearing the news, and then watching the second tower fall in my AP History class.  I remember feeling so helpless, and angry and wondering why we weren’t kicking some ass already.  I remember people being frustrated at Bush’s calm demeanor, not dropping bombs on Afghanistan the next day and waiting to make sure his intelligence was  correct on who did this.  I remember this.  I remember the nightmares that Bin Laden has caused our country and the rest of the world.  So when I woke up and saw on my Facebook news feed that Bin Laden was dead, I was happy.  I never thought that I would be happy that another human being was dead.  To be honest I was thinking in my head, “ding-dong the wicked witch is dead.”  I know that is so callous.  Here is the truth, Bin Laden being dead doesn’t end terrorism, not by a long shot, and to be  honest his death may make things worse for a while.  Bin Laden’s death is an emotional victory for the United States, and that is why so many people are angry that photos weren’t released and that our government dropped his body in the ocean.  Our leaders didn’t allow the country to fully absorb anything, and with the lies told to us by other administrations in the last 40 years, Americas are skeptical.  The truth is America has been a country who has been angry at one man for one-act for 10 years, and our government didn’t give us the chance to fully absorb the ending of that anger.  There isn’t acceptance yet.  I just hope it comes soon.

Related articles

• Schieffer’s ‘Obama bin Laden’ gaffe unfortunate, but not unusual (news.yahoo.com)
• Oh yeah? Maybe Pres Obama was waiting for “W” to get his mouth off bin Laden’s p*n*s … (blackwriteandread.wordpress.com)
• First bin Laden film premieres just in time for U.S. vote (dailystar.com.lb)
• First film on bin Laden raid pulls 2.7 million viewers (dawn.com)
• The Finish by Mark Bowden: The Killing of Osama Bin Laden – review (guardian.co.uk)
• SEAL Team Six Ushers in the Osama bin Laden Raid Fan Fiction (usnews.com)
• 911 Phony proofs: A gallery of faked dead Bin Ladens (sott.net)
• Ask the Advisor: With Osama bin Laden Dead, How Does that Affect the Stock Market? (savings.com)
• That’s a huge weight off my shoulders. (louisianefille.wordpress.com)
• Twitter Hoax: R.I.P. Navy Seal Who Killed bin Laden (wafflesatnoon.com)

Former president of the Philippines, Corazon Aquino, at the 2003 Ninoy Aquino award ceremony (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/01/world/asia/01aquino.html

On this date of Corazon Aquino‘s passing it got me thinking. What do our founding men and women really say about a country? Now for those of you who don’t know Corazon Aquino was the first democratic leader of the Philippines. After the long reign of Marcos, she led the country to democratic freedom under the banner of “People Power,” and helped lead a bloodless revolution that ended a dictatorial government. Although Aquino was criticized for not going far enough with her polices and actions her presidency survived for six years was succeeded by another democratically elected president.

This got me thinking about how Americans and people the world over think about their leaders, and then how we rewrite history when they die. Let’s take a great current example of Ronald Reagan. Now before Reagan’s death when people discussed his polices all one heard was Reaganomics this and didn’t care about the poor that. And when he died it was, Reagan ended the Cold War, Reagan made being a conservative cool again. For one thing I don’t need a man with Alzheimer’s to make being a conservative cool. I just love how politics is relative to the opinion of people. I guess that’s why I double majored in history and politics in college because there is always a bias in both fields but it’s harder to argue with history because you have documents, physical evidence of the who, what, when where, and how. Now politics will answer the why, but babe there sure is a lot of why and it seems to me every 50 years that why can change.

Related articles

• Aussie leaders praise Corazon Aquino for being democracy icon (globalnation.inquirer.net)
• Aquino visits parents’ tomb (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Aquino working on ‘long weekend’ (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Aquino’s visit to parents’ graves a private affair – Palace (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Death, winning and the 2013 sympathy vote (rappler.com)
• Angry netizens feel Aquino went too far with ‘wheelchair’ joke (technology.inquirer.net)
• French PM to make first ever visit to PH (rappler.com)
• Lawmaker wants CAFGU activities probed (philstar.com)
• Philippines’ 1986 People Power Revolution (achievingworldpeacenow.wordpress.com)
• Feasibility of Decentralizing Judicial Services in Rural Areas (thinkingbookworm.typepad.com)