40 Years

It was 40 years ago tonight that I graduated high school.
Looking back and looking forward, I am proud that so many of the ideals four of us expressed in our graduation speeches remain attainable.
And so many of them have been attained.
I am proud that my old high school now has an anti-bullying policy and staff to back it up.
I am proud that my old high school now has a GLBT Straight Alliance that meets weekly.
I am proud that our country has made so much progress.
Happily, I was able to work with cool people to right wrongs, from Washington, D.C. to Appalachia to nuclear bomb factories to federal agencies to St. Augustine, Florida.
There is much yet to be done.
In the words of poet, Alfred, Lord Tennyson:

The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.