Endurance

I've been thinking lately that we Americans are going to need a virtue we haven't been much called on to collectively display lately: Endurance. It seems likely that we're not going to live so close to the top of Maslow's pyramid as we have for most of my lifetime, but that doesn't mean we can or should give up. We're simply going to have to learn to endure bad times and persevere through them.

Our art these days doesn't teach us much about endurance, but it used to. I listened to this song this morning:

Well, there's a dark and a troubled side of life
There's a bright and a sunny side too
But if you meet with the darkness and strife
The sunny side we also may view

Keep on the sunny side, always on the sunny side
Keep on the sunny side of life
It will help us every day, it will brighten all the way
If we keep on the sunny side of life

Oh, the storm and its fury broke today
Crushing hopes that we cherish so dear
Clouds and storms will in time pass away
The sun again will shine bright and clear

It's probably time to get into that mindset.