Do not Go Gentle Into that Good Night

Yes, years ago Ms. Debra Ramon have a speech to the graduating Class of The American School Foundation in Mexico City in 2016.  It reached every soul and heart string in the audience as much hatred in words was strewn towards those outside of the United States.  As Americans it was difficult to be proud of being an American in another country when comments of hatred, vengeance, isolation, and division were being passed to the public as carelessly as words of love and generosity could have been.  Years later, I have seen those young ladies and gentlemen from Mexico, The United States, Colombia, Brazil, China, South Korea, Japan, and many more countries do nothing but present the best of what can be done in the face of such negative affronts of communication and turning action into change, and positive change as that.  It has been an honor to have been in the audience on the other side of the United States, as a faculty member at ASF in Mexico City and now see them graduating from college and pursuing the missions of peace, positive change, and dedication to creating a better world out of one surrounded by hate.  They never decided to to “Go gentle into that Good Night.”

3:00 AM?  Many that know me know I often wake up in the middle of night and send out messages when many are sound asleep.  There is much now, and then, that have kept me up late at night, and often, too tired during the day and need to find some respite in sleep. Many will say the year 2020 will do that to you.

Here we are in 2020 – and wow what a 2020. We could go on and one about how woeful we are in such turmoil, how much to blame are others for the predicament we are in, because there is plenty of that to go around.  Yet, having the honor of being a Class Advisor this side of the United States at Woodbridge High, and reading name after name of potential changers of our future, from Night to Day, it is often hard to concentrate on the names in front of me when I see so much potential in those names.  There is little difference in these young men and women I see in front of me though many would yell, scream, and shout that there is all the world of difference based on appearances and origin. 

For once, if we set aside appearances and origin, and realize that this side of the United States, or another side of the United States, America extends beyond a boundary we often make in our minds and restrict to our actions.  The largest message that needs to be instilled is the fact that these young men and women of 2020, more than graduating in a year influenced by a pandemic and racial conflict, have been handed a microscope and events that rely on their shoulders to make right.  These young men and women see themselves as barely getting by high school, or hitting all the right grades and words to land them spots at coveted locations they see as marking the success box on their checklist handed down to them from those that see money, position, power as the essential marks of such success.  We have seen that money, position,  and power often can lead to greed, unfair advantage and a desecration of equality across a country, as well as across ethnic and racial backgrounds.  Who will remind and encourage this class of 2020 that they are the light that can invade this darkest of darkest nights?  

That graduating class of ASF in Mexico years ago had much more common with this graduating class in the United States, and not just at Woodbridge High, but also every public school IN the United States.  We witnessed an amazing coming together of Delaware public schools when our beloved Troy Hayes was stricken too short by our standards in life.  Yet, his life never was in vain, as we saw that his life brought together hundreds, if not thousands of individuals together in one state and beyond state borders.  If there ever was a need to carry that momentum forward and have that life, and so many hundreds about thousands we have lost this past 2019-2020 year to so many pandemic, racial, and hateful events, we need to help remind this Class of 2020 they are not graduating into a hateful, ugly, unfair year.  They are being born into a chance to make the changes tat current leaders cannot make due to their blindness into this dark, darkest of nights. 

Congratulations Class of 2020, you are certainly the light that can change the face of the world, we are depending on it.