June is Bustin’ Out All Over!
It is greater than the 95 degrees, or projected 99 degrees, this week. June is bursting, or, busting with special days. Music fans may recall June is Bustin’ Out All Over, the 1956 Broadway musical, Carousel, courtesy of famed Rodgers and Hammerstein.
June has special days and often four and five special days each day. For example: June 1 is Hazelnut Cake Day and Oscar the Grouch Day. June 2 is National Moonshine Day. June 11 is National Rose Day. There are days with greater significance:
• June 6 is D-Day, in 1944, when Allied Forces in World War II made the critical push on the beaches of Normandy in France to turn the tide away from the Nazi stronghold toward Allied victory. Voices from the past recoil from the diminished role given to D-Day as significant. In essence it is Democracy Day. Democracy is continually threatened, something more of us realize each passing year by attacks in many places, both foreign and domestic.
• June 14 is Flag Day, a salute to the significance attached to the U.S. Flag which was established in 1777 when the flag design was approved in the U.S. collection of 13 colonies. It is the Red, White, and Blue. In a sense, it is a symbol of democracy, if we can keep it. Challenges are continual, foreign and domestic.
• June 19 this year is Father’s Day and this year is the first-time official Juneteenth, when slavery officially was ended in Texas in 1865, the first state to make if official, even though the battle to end slavery was a part of the U.S. Civil War, 1861-1865, that ended in April 1865. Communication lapses precluded knowledge of the exact end date of slavery by many, so it was commonly referred to as Juneteenth. We have freedom in the Country today, if we can keep it. We must recognize threats in uncommon places
• June 21 is Summer Solstice, the day when Summer is official and the amount of daylight diminishes each day, gradually thereafter. We will have more than 15 hours of daylight June 21 and less than eight hours of daylight December 21. We adjust, adapt, improve, survive. It is the expectation.
• June 25 will be a special day for St. Nicholas Catholic Grade School in Aurora with its reunion at Luigi’s Pizza and Fun Center, 732 Prairie Street, Aurora, in one of its last day prior to closing.
We can make each day special without a title or designation, if we choose, and eschew the negativity of some individuals. June may be remembered for the U.S. House of Representatives special committee which held hearings, recorded testimony, and collected facts on former U.S.. president Donald Trump’s bid to stay in power by any means necessary, legal or illegal. There should be no joy in the committee’s work. As disdainful as it may be for some U.S. residents, and as divisive as it may be, it reflects the tenor of the Country. Sweeping it under the rug, metaphorically, will do little good. Our democracy was under attack. Full disclosure is the first step in moving on, to being resilient, to start over. Politics can be a messy business for many, however, it is means by which we exist each day, and we have choices whether to be respectful, honest, and direct, or, to be disrespecting, lying, and indirect.
We continually have choices. Democracy is not about liberal or conservative, It is respect, concern for the common good, and honesty. We have choices. We must begin to heal and make an effort to heal.