Rifling through my envelope…

March 13, 2007, 1:11 pm; posted by Job Tate
Filed under Articles, Job | 1 Comment

I have an envelope, legal-sized, that I keep tucked inside my dictionary. I call it my intellectual cryo-chamber and it’s filled with articles from various publications, regarding topics I couldn’t reach a conclusion about when I first read them. I “freeze” these articles Ted Williams-style for future Job, hoping he will have developed the mental technology to make some determination about the subject matter. I went through that envelope last night.

7/12/05 — Northwestern U. women’s lacrosse team makes headlines when many players wear flip flops to a formal White House function.

I remember reading this article and feeling so very and unusually unsure about its implication. The President’s smile seems to be one of the more impromptu, wide and genuine of any of his photographed grins. The man is beaming. But as a Vermont Republican just beginning to sense what a beating he would endure the final three years of his presidency, I felt some resentment that the President was perhaps being subtly, even subconsciously, slighted in his own residence. Despite how relaxed he looked, I felt like maybe I should feel indignant on his behalf? Needless to say, the article, cut out and folded twice, went into my envelope.

So when I unfolded it again, almost two years later, I looked at the photo and re-read the article, checking its pulse for something new in the light of what’s happened since. All I see now is that same President, not easily offended, and a constituency relaxed in his presence. I see grace and good humor. I see an America I enjoy living in.

What I don’t see are the articles that joined it in the same publication — articles that could have been printed alongside, reporting in detail on the Cindy Sheehan saga, or perhaps Hugo Chavez’s many bellicose statements. Articles which never mentioned how grossly inappropriate either person’s behavior was towards the leader of the free world.

The media invented dismay over the most frivolous of things, while the office and our country was antagonized by true threats. I folded the article again, twice, and threw it away — embarrassed that I once considered being offended by something as benign as a comfortable pair of sandals.