Keeping Lines of Communication Open

While listening to Weekend Edition on NPR yesterday, I heard a brief local article about a high school student in Philadelphia that  is promoting a letter writing campaign to the White House.  The student felt that her voice and others her age were not being heard because they are not of voting age. I said to my self......self this is a really emotionally astute young person.  What she is doing is something that a friend of mine taught me many years ago.  Keep the lines of communication open.

This friend related a story to me about raising her daughter.  As is the case with many teens, her daughter was having some rough times in her mid teen years.  She made it a point to sit and speak with her daughter every night.  Her daughter did not want to talk, but my friend consciously  made it a point to sit and talk to her daughter with the hope that her daughter would respond, would share herself, would talk to her mom.  Gladly, my friends daughter turned out to be a great adult.  I cannot say with certainty that keeping the lines of communication open on a regular, nightly basis was a contributing factor for this happy outcome of what could have been an unhappy ending, but it certainly couldn't have hurt.  The possible flip side could have been the child experiences neglect and is left to her own devices, takes a bad path and does not have a good life.  Certainly, making sure to do the hard emotional work of maintaining communication with her daughter could have only helped.

I feel like this story applies to our current elected and appointed officials.  I feel like they are wayward children, going down the wrong path.  We are the parents.  Even 16, 17 and 18 year old teens are seeing this.  The young woman I heard on my local NPR affiliate, WHYY in Philadelphia, seems to recognize the need for keeping lines of communication open.  As distasteful as we may find it, to attempt to 'speak' with many of our elected  officials in a civil tone, we must.  If we neglect them, the chances for them to walk down a bad path may very well increase.  And if they walk down a bad path, it won't just effect their lives.  With reference to House representatives and Senators, that wayward path won't just effect their constituents.  The decisions these people make will effect all of us. Obviously trump will affect all of us.

We have many lines of communication available to us;  Phone, email, regular mail, certified mail, the media, letters to editors, protests, town hall meetings, one on one meetings w/our representatives, the ballot box.  We are using all of these forms of speaking with our elected officials and we will continue to do so.  

Today's post is shorter than usual because this topic is simple and direct.  Keep speaking with our child like representatives.  Do not neglect them.  They have a definite tendency to go astray from a moral and decent  road, and that will only turn out badly for us.  We need to be responsible for ourselves and therefore it is only we, the people, that can ensure that our needs are taken care of.  Congress and trump et.al. are not and will not be looking out for our interests.  They are children and it is our responsibility to place them and keep them on a good path.