A friend’s daughter is in labor.  A circle of family and friends are with the dilation as we wait and visualize 8 cm.  I remember back to the birth of my sons, that transition period, and it can be painful, very painful, and then the reward, all pain forgotten, only the joy of a new being in the world, a deepening connection and reverence for continuing life.

Perhaps what’s happening in this country right now is childbirth.  Painfully, we gather in community to renew and expand the vows on which this country was founded.  We re-read the Constitution and Declaration of Independence over and over again, trying to teach it to those who are working to overthrow our government and create a dictatorship.  

When those who object to the policies of this corrupt administration are labeled and murdered as domestic terrorists, we come together to act, and as in childbirth, we expand in connecting new cords when one is cut.