El Greko, thanks. But I learned this in a peer counseling community, not in my present "calling" or upbringing. When you have held all sorts and conditions of men and women in your arms and heard their stories as they weep (or rage, or laugh), you find they all feel about the same weight, no matter the measure. But from that experience, yes I do extrapolate in my "calling" and maybe this is part of why people open not only their hearts to us, but their spirits.

I think, at bottom, GYC challenges us not to "educate" those he calls the "mutt people," but to acknowledge that we ALL benefit from their having accepted the roles in the food chain he describes. And they are tired of being laughed at in redneck jokes, of being stereotyped as Bushite idiots, and of being blamed for the world's ills.

Country music has been full of anthems about the positive values rural/mutt people live by, in this last year. And it's more than lip service, more than saber-rattling in a time of war, more that Bush-hyped patriotism, more than Bible-thumping-- Hardi and I see these values lived every day, in every segment of our rural community. Values about neighboring, taking care of the world, holding family close, loving our elders as they become more and more wise and precious with the years. Bedrock tenacity, reflected in the values.

Something is stirring that we best hear, in that music. As we ourselves are music people first and foremost, we may find ourselves understanding more and fearing/jeering less.

BOONDOCKS MUSIC VIDEO

Now, here we have a MUSIC thread.

~Susan