Up until now Harvey has been an invisible rabbit to me, but now it will also be a storm here in Houston. Watching people react to this storm has been odd, because they have been manipulated by media to the point of hysteria or ignorance. If you shout apocalypse then the conformists will panic, but the rebels will become immune to worry. Some are terrified and others are complacent.
If you were one of the people snatching the last bag of chips from our K-Mart, you have consumed too much media, trusted the hype too explicitly, and now are huddled in your closet with bags of Sour Cream and Onion chips, and have shamed American manhood. Our grandparents or great-grandparents did not defeat Hitler and Stalin with their stored food. We took the huddled masses and taught them to breath free. Now we take those breathing free and chain them to media that teaches them to huddle. Be brave in the face of the tempest. Many of us think we can control our fate, but this is nonsense. The tornados that are landing here in my town do not care about my power or position. To quote Shakespeare during a different Tempest:
You are a counsellor; if you can command these elements to
silence, and work the peace of the present, we will
not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you
cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make
yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of
the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts!
I might die in a storm, God knows. I ask for safety, do what I should do, then realize that nothing can prevent my fate. God will do what God does and so “cheerly, good hearts!”
Yet the people I have seen ignoring the advice of the first responders are equally foolish and have this added evil: they put the lives of others at risk. The fools who refuse to evacuate and then must be rescued, endanger themselves and the brave men who try to save them. I have met people who root for hype, think every warning is false and all bad news is simply marketing. They are cheerful, not from faith in God, but out of intentional ignorance. They desire bliss, false happiness, so pretend that being prudent is being afraid. If many are Chicken Little, thinking the sky is falling when it is not, these fools are the grasshopper assuming if they play hard enough, then winter will never come.
The middle way is to do what can be done, say our prayers, and then rest in God. I avoid media that cries havoc, but also those who say “peace, peace” when there is no peace. This is not easy in our time, because the panic stricken will think you a fool and forget that their fear was unjustified as they move to the next crisis and the brazenly ignorant will assume any preparation is a sign of cowardice.
Ignore it all. Do what is prudent. Pray. Trust God and go about your duty.
Cheerly, good hearts!
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