Sitting in the Shade

With my life a little slower than normal lately, (doing great) I have been taking some time to sit in the shade, and read.  I love reading history.  It is amazing to read about world events, and great world leaders.  The truth is incredibly  entertaining, and also amazing because it is the truth.  Imagine the greatest Hollywood scripts: love stories, tales of incredible individual courage, astonishing feats of human endurance, legendary tales of leadership, and accomplishment, and personal triumph over tremendous adversity.  Great reading as fiction, and fantastic reading  as nonfiction.  Aside from the great content, and the fact that these stories are true, there is the added enjoyment of learning.

My latest read is Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin.  It tells the story of Abraham Lincoln's rise to the presidency, and how he kept the country together through the Civil War.  It details not only his life but those of his primary rivals for the Republican nomination in 1860 who eventually end up working under him in his cabinet.  The book, and others like it I have read, are very enjoyable as they put the flesh on the bones of "legendary" figures in history.  As the story unfolds, I remember small snippets from school.  There are usually many "ah-ha, so that's where that came from" moments.

Lincoln was an incredible man.  What we know about him from our basic schooling is all true, but there is so much more.  It is one thing to know that he was born in a log cabin on the frontier in Kentucky to a poor family, but it is another to read the details of what it meant to overcome life's challenges and end up probably the greatest and most important President since Washington.

One thing that strikes me as I read about the great leaders that have shaped our nation is it seems as though when things get dire, some great person comes along to keep us on track.  I look at the nation building attempts across the world today, and see mostly floundering and failure.  Why did the right leaders at the right time "appear" here in America?  Perhaps it is more than the right leaders at the right time.  Perhaps it is the idea of America.  The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution lay out some incredible ideals that reach out and touch the soul.  Perhaps it is those ideals that turn decent leaders into extraordinary ones when crunch time comes.  I like to think that.

That's All