Pondering Change

Even while vacationing here in Maine, the first thing that came to my mind as I awoke this morning were the events of 9/11.  How those events changed and shaped our lives and the course of world history!  When our children were little and wanted to go somewhere for an outing, we would often take them to the airport to watch the airplanes land and take off.  We could roam the airport at will back then and I can still see their little noses pressed against the windows along the concourses.  There was no TSA; no security lines through which one had to pass.  The world changed on 9/11 and we can never return to the world we knew before, just as we cannot return to the world “that was” before Pearl Harbor.  

The same can be said for Hurricanes Harvey and Irma.  Just as Katrina changed New Orleans and the lives of thousands, so these storms will change Houston, TX and Naples, FL and so many other places.  More significant is that fact that it will forever affect those who were victims, those who lost everything.  The world so many knew before Harvey and Irma is gone—a new world dawns, a new stream of history—and even with all the resources available, they will never be able to return to the world “that was” before.

Here we are in Maine, at a campground we have visited several times before, but now under new ownership.  Even this place has changed and will never be what it “appeared to be” when we first visited some eight years ago.  Everything changes—including me!

Yesterday we stopped at a small local eating establishment—just a little place with a few tables covered with vinyl tablecloths—a place where the locals go. I came to Maine for clam chowder and lobster and decided to get started on my agenda right away, so I ordered chowder.  (I’m still not sure if I said, “clam” chowder or just “chowder”).  When the waitress brought the big bowl of “chowder” I noted that it had big chunks of fish in it.  “Is this clam chowder?” I asked.  “No,” she said, “it’s ‘haddock’ chowder.  We don’t have any ‘clam’ chowder.” Now if I had known they only served “haddock” chowder I would never have ordered it (I’m not big on fish in my chowder).  All my hesitation about “haddock” chowder, however, vanished at first taste and I ate the whole bowl and could have gone for more!     Changes in history, circumstances, attitudes, and even our eating preferences come with every passing day.  There is no going back, not ever—we have only one option—to move forward as best we can, letting go of the old that once was (clam chowder) and taking on the new as it comes to us (haddock chowder).