Cultural Heroes in Difficult Times

Cultural Heroes in Difficult Times

Thank you to those who told me that they missed my columns during the last few months. [Summer, 2012, ed.] We were getting into the last convulsions of some very bitter political campaigns. I felt strongly tempted to respond to the upwelling of political partisanship by fighting a battle of ideas in print. Lord, some of those letters to the editor got me steamed. Instead, I put a bumper sticker on my car that said: “You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts.”

I almost got sucked into arguing with the undoubting faithful from the other side. That has variously been compared to “confronting a shadow in a knife fight,” “grabbing the ears of an angry dog” and “throwing pearls before swine.” Nothing good can come of it.

On the other hand, I believe we should persistently doubt our own assumptions, opinions and preconceived notions. It’s like I used to tell my boys, “It’s okay to talk to yourself and it’s even okay to argue with yourself, but when you start to lose those arguments, it’s time to start asking new questions.”

The Traditional Virtue of Liberality

"Liberality is not so much a political identification as a personal disposition toward empathy and selflessness. This is the mark of our most inspiring and honored teachers, leaders, heroes ... and saints."
~ David Satterlee

Information and comments on the story:
The Two Heroes of Thompsonville

from the book: Life Will Get You in the End:
Short stories by David Satterlee

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Another fable of conservative values. What happens if a culture takes the idea of naming kids after both of their parents and makes it a hard-and-fast tradition?

Life Will Get You in the End:
Short Stories by David Satterlee

The Two Heroes of Thompsonville

Thompsonville was nowhere. It was a town of modest size and not completely isolated, but mostly self-sufficient with its own traditions and community standards. The railroads had passed it by during the great expansion. The express highways had passed it by as well. It was too hilly for a canal – it was too flat for a reservoir. 

No native son ever grew up to be a governor or general. No one ever started a museum of tiny carved furniture or old farm implements. It was just a nice out-of-the-way place to live. As a matter of fact, it was a nice place to grow old and die if you didn’t wander off in search of something-or-other first.

Labith didn’t just wander off. He hit the road with a vengeance. He had loved his childhood sweetheart, Roatrine for as long as he could remember. They had played together as babies, studied together in school and, in the course of time, come to know each other very, very well. 

How could Roatrine refuse to marry him now? Why would she