Bird Droppings February 8, 2011
Courage is more than an act it is living
Today I was out and about much earlier than normal which got me off to a later writing and pondering time than usual. Traditionally I start each morning going through emails and checking blog sites for news. Over the past years a good friend up in Pennsylvania who has a few chickens as pets running about his yard and has immortalized them in his Chicken Dairies which he sends out nearly daily. As I was sitting thinking about the concept of courage I recalled one of his chickens King Calico and stories of this brave bantam rooster.
“A sad situation… Calico is so ostracized by the flock that he sleeps alone in the small original coop. I never re-affixed the door which was blown off in a recent windstorm, so he had to suffer in the big winter storm last night. I would love to anthropomorphize and say he merely doesn’t want to wake up the others when he gets up so early to patrol the yard, and likewise when he retires for the night after all the others are sleeping. But more likely, the rest don’t even like him. Perhaps it is something in his past. Even his favored son stays with his buddies at night.” Alan Gold
This entry in the Chicken Diaries was nearly five years ago and in it King Calico had recently been deposed by three younger roosters. But even in his solitude he still is the guardian of the flock. Granted courage is anthropomorphized by King Calico still vigilant after being pushed aside, but then again courage is a difficult word. We use it so loosely at times, oh yes he was courageous and or she has courage. But what are we really saying. What is courage?
Many years ago young Native American warriors to show courage in battle would ride into the enemy ranks and touch someone this was called counting coop. Some warriors carried coop sticks instead of spears and weapons and rather than kill an enemy from a distance or even close at hand having another witness the touch was the bravest act of all. An eagle feather symbolizing courage was the reward. There was a single feather for an act of courage.
I was thinking as I read my friends chicken dairies and having followed for quite a while now King Calico has stood up to foxes and coyotes, dogs and hawks, numerous predators protecting his flock seemingly never concerned for himself and even in the story above deposed still guarded the flock. Courage is without reward many times. I thought back many years to a little girl I worked with she was totally encircled with a body brace to protect her back as she was incapacitated with spina bifida. This is an opening in her spinal column and many times as was the case with her she was paralyzed from that point down. But she wasn’t stopped and while she could not walk she scooted using her arms every where and talked more than many kids her age sometimes too much. One thing I remember was she was always happy and this could be courage, a child’s simple courage.
I know of a young man from my county who in a car accident became a paraplegic and has been confined to a wheel chair since. Years back my father hired him as a consultant and he worked on various projects at our office. One day he came forward with an idea about running for Probate Judge in our county. The incumbent had been around quite some time and no one ever ran against him. It took courage to run for office in our county since back in the day politics wasn’t as dirty as it is today, it was filthy and it seriously took courage to run. This man went out campaigning in his wheel chair rolling around the county meeting folks and shaking hands. Amazingly bit by bit citizens were won over and he was elected. That was over twenty years ago and he is still our county probate judge unopposed now for all those years. Now that is courage but I can guarantee he would deny it.

“The courage of life is often a less dramatic spectacle than the courage of a final moment; but it is no less than a magnificent mixture of triumph and tragedy.”- John Fitzgerald Kennedy

I have looked at the various videos of JFK’s car riding through the streets of Dallas Texas numerous times on news and documentaries. I have read about Kennedy’s illnesses that nearly had him bedridden and he was in an open convertible riding through the streets of Dallas waving to the crowds. I drove by the spot when I was in school in Plano Texas in 1968 and I still wonder how courage is truly defined.

“A ‘No’ uttered from deepest conviction is better and greater than a ‘Yes’ merely uttered to please, or what is worse, to avoid trouble.” Mahatma Gandhi 20th century Indian spiritual & political leader

Mahatma Gandhi is another man who died because of and for his convictions. Many of us simply answer to eliminate the problem make it go away.

“A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.” Martin Luther King, Jr.

It is another day and another image I have seen so many times but there is an image of Dr. King I recall far more vividly standing on the steps of the Lincoln memorial and standing in front of so many people. There were people as far as the eye could see lining streets and every nook and cranny spreading out from his podium. Words came from his mouth carefully thought out and delivered. My father a professional speaker and teacher for so many years considers this one speech the most powerful sermon or speech ever given in his lifetime.

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Delivered on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. on August 28, 1963

Courage is a definitive belief in ones self and ones abilities to over come obstacles. I was looking for an end to this days thought and found a Lindbergh quote buried deep in a series of quotes about courage perhaps this is what courage is truly about.

“Any coward can sit at home and criticize a pilot for flying into a mountain in a fog. But I would rather by far die on a mountainside than in bed.” Charles Lindbergh, First person to fly across the Atlantic Ocean solo

Today keep all in your thoughts that need to summon up their inner courage to make it through the day. Keep our leaders, friends, family members and all who are in harms way in your hearts and on your mind.
namaste
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