Sludge

By Rev. Amari Magdalena

Years ago, I was driving an older Honda.  The fuel filter got clogged up.  Taking it to a mechanic, he told me that with older cars, you must keep your tank filled with gas and not let it ride down to empty as sludge accumulates at the bottom and mucks up the fuel filter and possibly the tank.  I’d been driving between Ft. Lauderdale FL and Atlanta GA.  As gas was so much cheaper in Georgia, I’d press it until I crossed the border.  Obviously, a mistake.

I got to thinking about our current political and social situation in the country.  The above is a great metaphor for what we are seeing manifest before us.    We collectively let the tank run too close to empty out of perhaps complacency or just some false sense of comfort.  In the eight years of the previous administration, there was a calmness and a steadiness that caused us to not get too concerned.  Sure, things came up, yet they seemed to get mainly handled and we rested on our laurels. 

Ahaa!  New administration and that fuel filter suddenly got clogged up and we are now looking at replacing the whole fuel system.  Sludge, it ain’t pretty, has appeared in every corner of our complacency. KKK, White Supremacy, gun violence, “Me Too”, return of misogyny, immigration witch hunts, incarcerating children, environmental protection dismantling, ad nauseum.  Everything under the hood, suddenly went to the proverbial hell and leaks and clogs prevailed.   Our engine is sputtering, and backfiring and we are wondering if we’ll ever be able to get the old car running or if we need to replace it.

"Maintenance," declared longshoreman Eric Hoffer, and lack thereof, leads to the demise of governments. Truth be told, we’ve got sludge everywhere: our oceans, our rivers, our air, even our own guts (nutritionists tells us). Folks, we’re here; no hiding from the truth, no fluff to cover it up, no mantras that are going to turn this engine over. 

It is time to stop complaining, moaning, bemoaning, gasping, choking on the sludge, and throwing up our hands.  The wheels have turned, and we must now build a better vehicle. Now is the moment for new ideas, think tanks, energetic salons of discussion, new politics/parties, new blood in the institutions, and a revision of what is the vehicle that will serve the most people.  We’ve tried universally various models: communism, socialism, dictatorship, oligarchies, monarchies, democracies, parliaments, republics, etc.  Where are the brilliant and inspired minds who can make new parts, perhaps salvaging the best of the old, and make something fantastic for the future?

We are them!  We are the solution.  Time to get out from under the hood and call the tow truck to haul off the broken-down car.  Moments to dream the dream that never was and say, “Why not!”  No more courses in how to repair the old.  Time to write the new script for a government that works for everyone and can be adapted as a turn-key model for any countries who are mired in sludge. 

As the Hopi prophesy said, we must let go of the shore and move into the flowing river and discover new banks.  Someone crashed that old car in the river and its trash has been clogging up the course of flow.  Let’s clear the debris. This is the time.  It’s why we are here!  

We can choose, delusion:

"To be frank, I think his world had vanished long before he ever entered it.  But, I will say, he certainly sustained the illusion with a marvelous grace." M. Moustafa on M. Gustafave (The Grand Budapest Hotel).  

Or the better way: "In a time of drastic change, it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists."  Eric Hoffer.