House of the Americans

And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. ~ Mark 3:25 ~ King James Bible

I have to tip my imaginary hat to G. R. R. Martin, and his epic tale of Westeros, the Seven Kingdoms, and the Lands Across the Narrow Sea, also known as Game of Thrones. The story is wildly popular among the masses from across the seven continents of our world.

I don’t know Mr. Martin, but the story he tells is a conglomeration of all the stories that have ever been told, and ever will be told. The oldest of these stories is “A House Divided Cannot Stand.”

Have we nothing to learn from Game of Thrones? Is it truly just an imaginary tale of lies, deceit and betrayal; of conquering and being conquered; of war and wars that are yet to come; and ultimately the war to end all wars? No, I say it is not. It is as relevant to reality as it is to fantasy.

The one thing we know of authors is that all the tales they tell are all the things they have experienced, learned, and all that has become what it is to be them (us). Game of Thrones, although not 100% historically accurate and not intended to be so, is the story of us – who we have been, who we are, and who we may yet become.

Today is Memorial Day 2016, in the House of the Americans. Our sigil is the Stars and Stripes. Our words are the Constitution of the United States, and the Declaration of Independence. Our small council is the Congress of the United States. Our leader, yet not Lord or King/Queen, is the President of the United States. Our leaders Hand is the Vice-President.

We the people have stood by watching all the royalty we have built in Hollywood. We honor them more than we honor those who have built this country through meaningful contributions. We fight amongst ourselves, slaying our own knights (police) in acts of violence unprecedented in our history. We lay claim that this life or that life matters, and stomp upon our own sigil until is crushed, tattered and torn, lying in the mud.

And worse than this, so much worse than this, we do not honor those who have fallen in the defense of our House. We say words of platitude without knowing the true meanings of those words. The elders of our House are slowly fading away into the hereafter, taking with them the living history that was theirs. All of WW I are already gone, many of WWII, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Desert Storm, Operation Freedom, and into the here and now. Their stories are falling upon deaf ears. They laid down their lives for our House and for what?

We cannot act like spoiled children anymore. We need to stand up and come together as one nation. Stop squabbling over the pettiness of life. I know, I know, pettiness is in the eye of the beholder, but in the grand scheme of things, while we fight amongst ourselves over who is more important, the Mother of Dragons is approaching with her Unsullied, her Second Sons, and ships by the number. Perhaps she is all she claims to be. Perhaps she is the savior of the Kingdoms, or perhaps she is not. Perhaps she is one to destroy us all. We do not know. But she is coming, and she will not take prisoners when she does. Either we are with her or against her. Either we are the House of the Americans or we are not. In the end, we will know. We will either stand and remain steadfast on the blood of those who gave all, or we will taint their lives to nothing more than vanity in a Game of Thrones in which they were nothing more than dispensable pawns in a much greater theatre of war.

On this day, this Memorial Day, let us not forget that all have contributed to the freedoms we enjoy. From every land and every nation and those from the first nation here on American soil, all have sacrificed much, for what we have now. Was it worth it? Are we a teenage nation having an identity crisis? Does our Sigil stand for nothing, or everything that we were, we are and we will be? Do our words mean nothing more than some ancient old men’s scrawling in acts of desperation to be free? Do our words:

 “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

have no meaning left in them?

Or these:

“The Home of the Free. The Land of the Brave”

Lest we forget.

For Honest and True Real

In 1922, one of the most celebrated children’s books of all time became a reality; The Velveteen Rabbit, by Margery Williams.

As students from high schools and colleges across the world prepare for Pomp and Circumstance to usher them into the “adulthood” of life, it is my hope that they will take with them all the stories they treasured as children. Because, contained within all the pages of all the bedtime stories is the secret of what it is to be real.

It’s easy – far too easy – to get lost in the hustle and bustle of adulthood and lose our sense of wonder. Life circumstances can overwhelm the most adept adult-er, dragging us down into the realms of fear, pain, and despair; the place where we forget who our friends are, and all of our favorite things.

The one thing that we learn from The Velveteen Rabbit is that to be for honest and true real, we must love and be loved in return.

As Mother’s Day comes to a close, all across the world mothers are tucking in their children, turning off the lights as bedtime stories come to a close. In The Velveteen Rabbit, as the little bunny’s quest to become real culminates with the kiss of the nursery fairy, know this:  the Nursery Fairy is your mother. Whether she gave birth to you, adopted you into her loving arms, or is your mother for only a short-time as a foster mother, she is the one who knows without prejudice, without judgment, and without restraint what love is, and to love and be loved is to be real. 

You are real and you are loved.