Hope Is Resistance

Hope is resistance.

So says the graffiti on my evening stroll.

We live in times where hope is scarce. Where violence and madness and hate flourish. Where night envelops day.

And yet….

Hope is resistance.

As a card carrying member of the cardio club, the slogan Fix Your Heart or Die hits home. But it doesn’t take a brain scientist to read the room. Heart in this case is more than just the beating muscle in my chest, more than the organ that keeps my wet red gooey stuff pulsing through my veins and arteries.

Fix Your Heart or Die is a direct plea and warning. Society needs to change our priorities, and these words implore us to reach across the aisle, to look far enough to see those who cannot walk in other shoes, to see those with no boots to pull themselves up from. Fix your heart or die is a command from inside ourselves, begging us to offer help. Because we know there is goodness that we have in common that can bind us, and this goodness may force us to realize this simple truth.:

We all breathe the same air.

We swim in the same polluted pool, we crash in the same car, we listen to the same stupid song. It is a song that doesn’t end. When one group stops singing, another group begins. We call this type of song a “round.”

Remember singing rounds of row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream?

Gently down that stream, we circle the bowl. We beat around the bush, then we search for the nearest exit in the roundabout.

Should we round up or should we round down?

Is there anybody watching? Are we being graded on a curve? The secret is the science. How by fixing our hearts, we allow hope to enter the room, to join the conversation, to make a small difference.

Maybe. But maybe, maybe is the only step forward. Maybe allows us the make another small step, and one day, when we look back, we see where we have actually come. Believe in the power of maybe.

Someone packed all their belongings in a hospital patient bag, then left it by the dumpster. I didn’t look inside. I took a picture.

I had a bag like that. I kept it to remember that feeling I had in a hospital.

But then one day, I recycled it to empty my garbage.

Maybe this bag was filled with belongings. Maybe it was the same bag I had thrown out months ago.

We are more alike than we are different. Maybe is the baby steps, the maybe steps.

Hope comes from the power of maybe.

Hope is resistance.