Martin Luther King Jr. Remembered 2010

I found an interesting commentary about the Dr. Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. today while reading the book, Evolve Your Brain, by Dr. Joe Dispenza.

Dispenza, a Doctor of Chiropractic Medicine, reveals how we can change our past - personal, family, and even our genetics through understanding the chemistry of the brain. He provides scientific information as to how our thoughts create chemical reactions that hold us to addictive patterns and feelings and how to reprogram our brains to break free of those cycles. He also demonstrates, as in the example of Dr. King, how holding to a vision can create a new future.


"For example, the Civil Rights movement would not have had its far-reaching effects if a true individual like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., had not, despite all the evidence around him (Jim Crow laws, separate but equal acomodations, snarkling attack dogs, and powerful fire hoses), believed in the possibility of another reality.

"Although Dr. King phrased it in his famous speech as a "dream," what he was really promising (and living) was a better world where everyone was equal. How was he able to do that? He decided to place a new idea in his mind about freedom for himself and a nation, and that idea was more important to him than the conditions in his external world.

"He was uncompromising in holding fast to that vision. Dr. King was unwillling to alter his thoughts, his actions, his behavior, his speech, and his message in response to anything outside of him.

"He never changed his internal picture of a new environment in spite of his external environment, even if it meant insult to his body. It was the power of his vision that convinced millions of the justness of his cause.

"The world has changed because of him."

Taken from p. 14, Evolve Your Brain
copyright 2007 Joe Dispenza, D.C.
published by Health Communications, Inc.


Amen. -Deb Adler


(Other posts by Deb Adler honoring Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:
http://debadlersblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/remembering-rev-dr-martin-luther-king.html)

©2010 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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Remembering Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and "Loving Your Enemies"

On this day, January 19, 2009, as we mark "Martin Luther King Day" around the nation while looking forward with great anticipation to the Inauguration of President-elect Barrack Obama as the 44th President tomorrow, January 20th, I wish to "re-publish" my articles in tribute to a man who, as one newscaster reminded us today, would be 80 years old if still living and able to witness the historic swearing in of the first Afro-American President of the United States. Dr. King was a personal hero to me. To this day his approach to winning freedom for an oppressed people and forging coalitions - rainbow bridges - continues to inspire me.

We are here to heal separation as the Human Family. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. knew that. He also understood the ways of the Peaceful Warrior. How I wish I could be able to see him standing there tomorrow in witness of this coming historic occassion, but then I know he will be there!

In appreciation and respect,Deborah Adler.

Archives reference: http://debadlersblog.blogspot.com/2008_01_01_archive.html

Yes, Monday was the day that Congress selected to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday. I remarked somewhere during the day to a friend of mine that I always used to take part in a memorial march on this day. It was almost a throw-away comment, because we were in the middle of preparing for the gifting of donated library materials to go to various centers in the community. My comment, if heard, I don’t really think was noted.

Perhaps we’ve grown past the day of marches…maybe they are part of the history to which the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. now belongs…a history that I am also a part of for having been there and participated…

My “wonder years,” as they have been described by a popular bread commercial of the 60’s and 70’s, included the assassinations of a U.S. President, a Spiritual and Civil Rights Leader, and a former U.S. Attorney General and Presidential Candidate; the birth of the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War conflict that ripped our nation apart, as if it needed any further help in that department. Marches and Sit-ins were the modus operandi of the day for standing up and speaking out and demonstrating solidarity. Today we have blogs and YouTube and other forms of electronic audio-visual communications to reach the global audience with our causes and concerns. Back then, we had megaphones, and placards painted with our messages of defiance and hope. We sang songs and chanted slogans in unison. Yes, when Ms. Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of the bus, it ushered in a whole new era – for all of us.

I was in junior high school when John Kennedy, our nation’s President, was shot. I remember being dismissed from school early after listening intently to the radio broadcast over the school’s public-address system from my math class room. When I got out to where our parents’ cars were already waiting, I remember getting in and the ominous ride home with my mother. I remember the fear I felt inside that we were without a leader and how vulnerable that might make us as a country. I asked her if the Communists were going to take over the country. “I don’t know,” she answered very quietly. “We have to get home.”

John Kennedy’s assassination stopped the world for 4 days, at least in the Detroit suburb of Oak Park, where I lived. The nation stayed glued to the TV, hanging on every update that Walter Cronkite, Chet Huntley and David Brinkley could bring of the initially sketchy details through the capture and then assassination of suspect Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby, the President’s body lying in state in the Capital, and the seemingly endless funeral procession through the streets of Washington D.C. to the burial site at Arlington National Cemetery, where a little boy, John-John, said goodbye to his Father with a military salute that captured the hearts of people around the world in the now immortalized front page photograph.

It seems when Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated, not all of the country stopped in quite the same way. Not everyone was touched in the same way, I suppose, because there were those who celebrated his death. People fed by the ignorance of hatred and bigotry claimed victory. The rest of us held our breath for the future of humanity, wondering would there ever be a time when there was true equality and peace.

These were heady questions for a young high school girl in the mid-1960’s. But they were what occupied my mind in the days following the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King.

Dr. King had become a hero to me. Even though I was not an Afro-American, I felt a personal identity with his vision. I was captivated by his eloquence, his passion, his courage, his leadership…his determination to win equality for all people through non-violent peaceful means.

Dr. King captured the heart of this idealistic young high school girl who personalized the racial strife in her country and hungered for a way to make a difference and be heard so that Afro-American people could know that not all White Americans hated those different from themselves. He provided a sure and steady power of example in those turbulent times. And Hope. He was a messenger for Faith and Hope.

So I found myself profoundly affected by the loss of this great leader, Dr. Martin Luther King. It was a loss I had to carry deeper inside myself than that of President Kennedy, because I did not find that it was shared by all of my friends – certainly not at the depth at which I felt it.

My respect and love for this man has grown through the years. I continue to be inspired by his vision and his powerful manner of delivery. May we dedicate our lives to unity and respect for all Beings, that all Humankind – black, white, red, yellow, straight, gay, young, old -- and all life on this planet, may know health, wealth and happiness and flourish. Above all, may we all know Dignity and Respect.


"Loving Your Enemies" from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I wanted to share some excerpts from one of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s speeches, which can be found in their entirety on the internet at http://www.mlkonline.net/speeches.htmlk, among other places.

There’s another reason why you should love your enemies, and that is because hate distorts the personality of the hater. We usually think of what hate does for the individual hated or the individuals hated or the groups hated. But it is even more tragic, it is even more ruinous and injurious to the individual who hates. You just begin hating somebody, and you will begin to do irrational things. You can’t see straight when you hate. You can’t walk straight when you hate. You can’t stand upright. Your vision is distorted. There is nothing more tragic than to see an individual whose heart is filled with hate. He comes to the point that he becomes a pathological case. For the person who hates, you can stand up and see a person and that person can be beautiful, and you will call them ugly. For the person who hates, the beautiful becomes ugly and the ugly becomes beautiful. For the person who hates, the good becomes bad and the bad becomes good. For the person who hates, the true becomes false and the false becomes true. That’s what hate does. You can’t see right. The symbol of objectivity is lost. Hate destroys the very structure of the personality of the hater.

...long before modern psychology came into being, the world’s greatest psychologist who walked around the hills of Galilee told us to love. He looked at men and said: "Love your enemies; don’t hate anybody." It’s not enough for us to hate your friends because—to to love your friends—because when you start hating anybody, it destroys the very center of your creative response to life and the universe; so love everybody. Hate at any point is a cancer that gnaws away at the very vital center of your life and your existence. It is like eroding acid that eats away the best and the objective center of your life. So Jesus says love, because hate destroys the hater as well as the hated.

Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, "Love your enemies." It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. That’s why Jesus says, "Love your enemies." Because if you hate your enemies, you have no way to redeem and to transform your enemies. But if you love your enemies, you will discover that at the very root of love is the power of redemption. You just keep loving people and keep loving them, even though they’re mistreating you. Here’s the person who is a neighbor, and this person is doing something wrong to you and all of that. Just keep being friendly to that person. Keep loving them. Don’t do anything to embarrass them. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with bitterness because they’re mad because you love them like that. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies.

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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THE TRUTH ABOUT THE FEDERAL RESERVE

We, as citizens of the United States, have been subjected to an extreme amount of drama this week courtesy of Wall Street, the Federal Reserve and our dear lame duck President.

The following videos come from a movie called Zeitgeist. It exposes the myth of the Federal Reserve as a U.S. govenment agency. It also reveals who is really behind the financial solvency of not only our country, but the world at large. You will likely be surprised to find out that who you thought was in charge of our country’s money are merely pawns in a much larger playing field.

The drama of this past week has been craftily designed to create fear and panic and keep people under control by way of convincing us all of the scarcity of resource. Don’t buy into it. Do your research. It’s imperative as we head into the final weeks of the 2008 Election that Americans wake up and get the real picture.

To view a powerful video about the Federal Reserve go to:
http://debadler.wordpress.com/2008/09/20/the-truth-about-the-federal-reserve/

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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Billie Jean King is a Personal Hero of Mine...

Billie Jean Won for All Women
By Larry Schwartz
Special to ESPN.com

see: http://espn.go.com/sportscentury/features/00016060.html

(article follows:)

Billie Jean King won six Wimbledon singles championships and four U.S. Open titles. She was ranked No. 1 in the world five years. She defeated such magnificent players as Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert and Margaret Court.

It isn't a reach to say that Billie Jean King has done the most for women in their fight for equality in sports.

Yet of all her matches, the one that is remembered most is her victory against a 55-year-old man.

History has recorded all King accomplished in furthering the cause of women's struggle for equality in the 1970s. She was instrumental in making it acceptable for American women to exert themselves in pursuits other than childbirth. She was the lightning rod in starting a professional women's tour. She started a women's sports magazine and a women's sports foundation.

But what is remembered most about her is that she humbled Bobby Riggs.

Let's get that match out of the way. Riggs, a 1939 Wimbledon champion turned hustler, had already massacred Court on Mother's Day 1973. So King, who previously had rejected Riggs' advances for a match, accepted his latest challenge.

"I thought it would set us back 50 years if I didn't win that match," she said. "It would ruin the women's tour and affect all women's self esteem."

The "Battle of the Sexes" captured the imagination of the country, not just tennis enthusiasts. On Sept. 20, 1973 in Houston, she was carried out on the Astrodome court like Cleopatra, in a gold litter held aloft by four muscular men dressed as ancient slaves. Riggs was wheeled in on a rickshaw pulled by sexy models in tight outfits, "Bobby's Bosom Buddies."

King, then 29, ran the con man ragged, winning 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 in a match the London Sunday Times called "the drop shot and volley heard around the world."

"Most important perhaps for women everywhere, she convinced skeptics that a female athlete can survive pressure-filled situations and that men are as susceptible to nerves as women," Neil Amdur wrote in The New York Times.

But King was much more than the woman who undressed the self-proclaimed "male chauvinist pig" before a worldwide television audience estimated at almost 50 million. Above all, even more significant than her winning 39 Grand Slam singles, doubles and mixed-doubles titles, she was a pioneer.

"She has prominently affected the way 50 percent of society thinks and feels about itself in the vast area of physical exercise," Frank Deford wrote in Sports Illustrated. "Moreover, like (Arnold) Palmer, she has made a whole sports boom because of the singular force of her presence."

Navratilova said, "She was a crusader fighting a battle for all of us. She was carrying the flag; it was all right to be a jock."

It was for King's crusading that Life magazine in 1990 named her one of the "100 Most Important Americans of the 20th Century." Not sports figures, but Americans. She was the only female athlete on the list, and one of only four athletes (Babe Ruth, Jackie Robinson and Muhammad Ali were the others).

She was born Billie Jean Moffitt on Nov. 22, 1943 in Long Beach, Calif., the daughter of a firefighter father and homemaker mother. Her younger brother Randy would become a major-league pitcher.

She developed into a star softball shortstop before her parents decided that she should pursue a more "ladylike" sport and give up playing baseball and football. Her father suggested tennis, because it involved running and hitting a ball.

"I knew after my first lesson what I wanted to do with my life," she said.

Developing her game on the Long Beach public courts, the pudgy adolescent first gained international recognition as a 17-year-old in 1961 by winning with Karen Hantze the doubles championship at Wimbledon. It was the first of her 20 titles (10 doubles and four mixed to go with the six singles) on the hallowed English grass.

In 1966, King (by now she had married law-student Larry King) won her first singles Wimbledon title and was ranked No. 1, the first of three straight years at the top. The next year, the myopic pepper pot repeated at Wimbledon and won her first U.S. championship.

After having to get by on $100 a week as a playground instructor and student at Los Angeles State College while at the same time shining at Wimbledon, King became a significant force in opening tennis to professionalism. She carried a deep sense of injustice from her amateur days.

With the birth of the "Open" era in 1968, King turned pro. This time she received more than a trophy for winning Wimbledon. She was on her way to earning $1,966,487 in career prize money.

In those days, women players received much less money than men earned. King's voice was heard loudest in the quest for equality. When a new women's tour was started, with Philip Morris sponsoring a new brand of cigarette, King was perceived as a "radical" heading a breakaway group. The Virginia Slims Tour was marketed with the slogan "You've Come a Long Way, Baby."

Things improved financially. King became the first woman athlete to earn $100,000 in prize money in a year (1971), and President Richard Nixon called to congratulate her.

She convinced her colleagues to form a players' union, and the Women's Tennis Association was born. King was its first president in 1973. King, who received $15,000 less than Ilie Nastase did for winning the U.S. Open in 1972, said if the prize money wasn't equal by the next year, she wouldn't play, and she didn't think the other women would either. In 1973, the U.S. Open became the first major tournament to offer equal prize money for men and women.

The next year, King founded WomenSports magazine, started the Women's Sports Foundation, an organization dedicated to promoting and enhancing athletic opportunities for females, and with her husband, formed World Team Tennis.

In 1975, Seventeen magazine polled its readers and found that King was the most admired woman in the world. Golda Meir, who had been Israel's prime minister until the previous year, finished second.

Despite her promotions and activities away from the court, the 5-foot-4 King still played outstanding tennis. The same aggressive, hard-hitting net rusher she had been, she hated to lose. "Victory is fleeting," she said. "Losing is forever."

When she hit the perfect shot, she would become ecstatic. "My heart pounds, my eyes get damp, and my ears feel like they're wiggling, but it's also just totally peaceful," King said. "It's almost like having an orgasm -- it's exactly like that."

Unlike most athletes, King's sexual preference became a matter of public record. Two decades ago, having a lover of the same sex was viewed quite unkindly, and was sensational news. In 1981, King admitted her bisexuality amid a palimony suit brought by a former woman lover.

While King's former personal assistant lost the suit, King estimated the episode cost her and her husband millions in endorsements. Eventually, King and her husband were divorced.

After retiring from competitive tennis, she remained in the game -- as an announcer, coach and author. She gave clinics, became director of World Team Tennis, and played on a Legends tour. Her legs might have given out, but not her passion for the game.

King believes that she was born with a destiny to work for gender equity in sports and to continue until it's achieved.

"In the '70s we had to make it acceptable for people to accept girls and women as athletes," she said. "We had to make it OK for them to be active. Those were much scarier times for females in sports."


NPR MONDAY AUGUST 25 INTERVIEW with Billie Jean King
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93937984

"Morning Edition, August 25, 2008. As the 35th anniversary of Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs "Battle of the Sexes" match approaches, co-host Renee Montagne talks to tennis legend Billie Jean King about that famous match. King highlights the lessons that helped her win that match in a new book, Pressure is a Privilege - Lessons I've Learned from Life and the Battle of the Sexes."

Billy Jean King was interviewed by NPR Morning Edition's Renee Montagne this morning regarding the "Battle of the Sexes" match between Billie and Bobby Riggs, approaching its 35th anniversary.

When asked if she thought her victory over Riggs had an immediate impact on women's tennis, Billie Jean King replied, "It actually had an impact on tennis."

King cited the largest attendance ever for both the men's and women's professional tours in 1974, the year following her match with Riggs, and which has been attributed directly to it. In addition, the first network contracts for both men's and women's tennis were another direct result of the now historic event.

"It's funny how when a woman does something they always think we only affect half of the population," said King, commenting further on the "women's tennis" slant on Montagne's question. "I think people perceive women that way all the time and that's not good...If you effect one human being, I think its a domino effect. It changes the puzzle, the framing - everything."



I remember that wild and crazy tennis match. Never having watched a tennis match before in my life, I sat glued to the set with millions of others. We feminists had a personal stake in this match. "Male chauvinist pigs" stood on the brink of being silenced.

The principle of Equality, for which many of us were marching in the streets, was on the line.

Billie Jean King became a major hero to the feminist movement with her victory. The match was a media spectacle, admittedly, but the social, cultural and political impact of her victory is still being felt today.

"Also what came from this match is the first generation of men of the women's movement. Because I have men coming up to me today," King shared in the inteview, "that have daughters and they have tears in their eyes. And they tell me how that match.....they were ten years old, 12 years old 17 years old, and how that match changed their life and how they raised their daughters. They're the first generation of men that truly believe that their daughters and sons should have equal opportunity."

Actually, my Dad was totally a chauvinist, EXCEPT that he raised me to believe that I could be anything I wanted. Neither he nor my mother set limitations on my aspirations, which was cool, BUT not typical.

The struggle for equal treatment continues today. An article from the AFL-CIO states:

"Equal pay has been the law since 1963. But today, nearly 45 years later, women are still paid less than men-even with similar education, skills and experience."

"In 2007, women were paid only 77 cents for every dollar a man is paid, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Economist Evelyn Murphy, president and founder of The WAGE Project, estimates the wage gap costs the average full-time U.S. woman worker between $700,000 and $2 million over the course of her work life." See: http://www.aflcio.org/issues/jobseconomy/women/equalpay/

So, as the song says, "the beat goes on..." But not without a leader who is still an inspiration to multiple generations today. Billie Jean King's victory over Bobby Riggs helped to change some attitudes that needed updating. She wasn't the entire women's liberation movement, but she definitely gave it a huge boost that day.

Here's to you Billie Jean King. Rock on! -Deb Adler



Note: Cited sources and reprinted stories are copyrighted. All rights revert to the original publishers.

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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Ancient Village Opening Video

After three years of dedicated labor, volunteer including myself, got to celebrate the official opening of the Ancient Village in Summerfield, Ohio this fall.

Ancient Village features a series of structures dating from the earliest stone shelters to the more familiar log cabins of more recent generations. We follow humankind’s development of culture and society personified in the various living structures that we inhabited. It is a wonderful place to come and truly experience a world out of time.

This wonderful 28-minute video shares some of the structures, the history, the magic, and...oh, yes -- it includes me performing one of my original songs, "Livin' Your Dreams" in the ceremonial arbour.

This village is located adjacent to Friendship International Retreat and Training Center, which I and many volunteers have also helped to build over the past twenty years. Some of us have remained as resident staff.

You can find out more at http://www.ancientvillage.com/ and http://www.friendshipvillage.cc/

Welcome to my world...

Click HERE to view video from Google Videos

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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"Loving Your Enemies" from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I wanted to share some excerpts from one of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s speeches, which can be found in their entirety on the internet at http://www.mlkonline.net/speeches.htmlk, among other places.

Excerpts from “Loving Your Enemies:”

There’s another reason why you should love your enemies, and that is because hate distorts the personality of the hater. We usually think of what hate does for the individual hated or the individuals hated or the groups hated. But it is even more tragic, it is even more ruinous and injurious to the individual who hates. You just begin hating somebody, and you will begin to do irrational things. You can’t see straight when you hate. You can’t walk straight when you hate. You can’t stand upright. Your vision is distorted. There is nothing more tragic than to see an individual whose heart is filled with hate. He comes to the point that he becomes a pathological case. For the person who hates, you can stand up and see a person and that person can be beautiful, and you will call them ugly. For the person who hates, the beautiful becomes ugly and the ugly becomes beautiful. For the person who hates, the good becomes bad and the bad becomes good. For the person who hates, the true becomes false and the false becomes true. That’s what hate does. You can’t see right. The symbol of objectivity is lost. Hate destroys the very structure of the personality of the hater.

...long before modern psychology came into being, the world’s greatest psychologist who walked around the hills of Galilee told us to love. He looked at men and said: "Love your enemies; don’t hate anybody." It’s not enough for us to hate your friends because—to to love your friends—because when you start hating anybody, it destroys the very center of your creative response to life and the universe; so love everybody. Hate at any point is a cancer that gnaws away at the very vital center of your life and your existence. It is like eroding acid that eats away the best and the objective center of your life. So Jesus says love, because hate destroys the hater as well as the hated.

Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, "Love your enemies." It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. That’s why Jesus says, "Love your enemies." Because if you hate your enemies, you have no way to redeem and to transform your enemies. But if you love your enemies, you will discover that at the very root of love is the power of redemption. You just keep loving people and keep loving them, even though they’re mistreating you. Here’s the person who is a neighbor, and this person is doing something wrong to you and all of that. Just keep being friendly to that person. Keep loving them. Don’t do anything to embarrass them. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with bitterness because they’re mad because you love them like that. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies.

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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Remembering Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Okay, so I’m a little late sometimes….

Yes, Monday was the day that Congress selected to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday. I remarked somewhere during the day to a friend of mine that I always used to take part in a memorial march on this day. It was almost a throw-away comment, because we were in the middle of preparing for the gifting of donated library materials to go to various centers in the community. My comment, if heard, I don’t really think was noted.

Perhaps we’ve grown past the day of marches…maybe they are part of the history to which the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. now belongs…a history that I am also a part of for having been there and participated…

My “wonder years,” as they have been described by a popular bread commercial of the 60’s and 70’s, included the assassinations of a U.S. President, a Spiritual and Civil Rights Leader, and a former U.S. Attorney General and Presidential Candidate; the birth of the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War conflict that ripped our nation apart, as if it needed any further help in that department. Marches and Sit-ins were the modus operandi of the day for standing up and speaking out and demonstrating solidarity. Today we have blogs and YouTube and other forms of electronic audio-visual communications to reach the global audience with our causes and concerns. Back then, we had megaphones, and placards painted with our messages of defiance and hope. We sang songs and chanted slogans in unison. Yes, when Ms. Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of the bus, it ushered in a whole new era – for all of us.

I was in junior high school when John Kennedy, our nation’s President, was shot. I remember being dismissed from school early after listening intently to the radio broadcast over the school’s public-address system from my math class room. When I got out to where our parents’ cars were already waiting, I remember getting in and the ominous ride home with my mother. I remember the fear I felt inside that we were without a leader and how vulnerable that might make us as a country. I asked her if the Communists were going to take over the country. “I don’t know,” she answered very quietly. “We have to get home.”

John Kennedy’s assassination stopped the world for 4 days, at least in the Detroit suburb of Oak Park, where I lived. The nation stayed glued to the TV, hanging on every update that Walter Cronkite, Chet Huntley and David Brinkley could bring of the initially sketchy details through the capture and then assassination of suspect Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby, the President’s body lying in state in the Capital, and the seemingly endless funeral procession through the streets of Washington D.C. to the burial site at Arlington National Cemetery, where a little boy, John-John, said goodbye to his Father with a military salute that captured the hearts of people around the world in the now immortalized front page photograph.

It seems when Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated, not all of the country stopped in quite the same way. Not everyone was touched in the same way, I suppose, because there were those who celebrated his death. People fed by the ignorance of hatred and bigotry claimed victory. The rest of us held our breath for the future of humanity, wondering would there ever be a time when there was true equality and peace.

These were heady questions for a young high school girl in the mid-1960’s. But they were what occupied my mind in the days following the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King.

Dr. King had become a hero to me. Even though I was not an Afro-American, I felt a personal identity with his vision. I was captivated by his eloquence, his passion, his courage, his leadership…his determination to win equality for all people through non-violent peaceful means.

Dr. King captured the heart of this idealistic young high school girl who personalized the racial strife in her country and hungered for a way to make a difference and be heard so that Afro-American people could know that not all White Americans hated those different from themselves. He provided a sure and steady power of example in those turbulent times. And Hope. He was a messenger for Faith and Hope.

So I found myself profoundly affected by the loss of this great leader, Dr. Martin Luther King. It was a loss I had to carry deeper inside myself than that of President Kennedy, because I did not find that it was shared by all of my friends – certainly not at the depth at which I felt it.

My respect and love for this man has grown through the years. I continue to be inspired by his vision and his powerful manner of delivery. May we dedicate our lives to unity and respect for all Beings, that all Humankind – black, white, red, yellow, straight, gay, young, old -- and all life on this planet, may know health, wealth and happiness and flourish. Above all, may we all know Dignity and Respect.

-Deb

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

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You're Invited to a Fall Festival in Southeastern Ohio!

You are cordially invited to a Fall Festival.
Come join us for a day full of fun and entertainment on
October 27th 2007, at 2:00 – 7:00 pm. This event will be
located at Ancient Village which is an historical and
educational tourist site located in the majestic rolling hills of southeast Ohio.
see http://www.ancientvillage.com/
see also http://www.friendshipvillage.cc/, where Ancient Village is located.

If you have not experienced the Fall Season in our beautiful
Ohio Valley, you need to take advantage of this occasion to
do so. There are awesome views a top the hills and
delightful nature and her creatures to enhance the gathering.

You will want to see this before Old Man Winter comes and
covers us with a white blanket of snow!

Our Fall Festivities will include blue grass music, crafts, games and dancing and mouth watering food as well!

Ancient Village features a series of structures dating from the earliest stone shelters to the more familiar log cabins of more recent generations. We follow man’s development of culture and society personified in the various living structures that he inhabited. It is a wonderful place to come and truly experience a world out of time.

We look forward to sharing this magnificent wonder and enjoy the festivities together. A dinner menu of clam bake, chicken, fixings (and desserts) will be available.

There will be activities for the whole family – so load up the car and enjoy the fall crescendo of colors with good friends and family, and in an awesome Fall setting!!


RSVP your attendance TODAY!! Call 740-838-4033

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.

please vote for this article at Stumble, Digg, Furl, Del.icio.us, and Facebook. Thanks!




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