Discovering Perspective by Looking Back

“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.”

Rachel Carson

I went out to nature this morning. To visit the swans, Canadian geese, and coots. The fog passed around me in wisps. I breathed in reserves of strength, contemplating the beauty of the earth.

When I don’t want to be in the human world, I escape to the outdoors. I think about the rhythms and cycles of nature, compared to the chaos and disappointment of our human lives.

Currently, I don’t like how things are going and I haven’t for quite some time. I thumbed through some pebbles, and stared at out a pillared structure made of brick, wondering what purpose it had served.

Because everything serves a purpose, right? There has to be a reason for something to exist, and a reason why things happen the way they do. When I start to get bogged down in the heaviness of what’s happening now, I try to find a different perspective, or just perspective. A broader view.

Right now, America is filled with pestilence and discord. Full of violence and viruses. Not a happy place to be. But looking back over the past 120 years, times of turbulence and turmoil have been fairly constant. Sure, there are years in between where nothing too major happens. But in reality, disputes and disasters are more the rule than the exception.

To illustrate this point, I went to a document prepared by Baylor University of U.S. Historical Events from 1900 to Present. And I compiled what I felt were relevant examples of things that happen to us and because of us. Many other important things have happened during these decades, but I chose to focus mainly on natural disasters (things beyond our control), human-caused disasters, and major instances of people behaving badly.

1900-1909:

• 1900: Galveston hurricane leaves an estimated 6,000 to 8,000 dead
• 1901: McKinley’s second inauguration. He is shot by anarchist Leon Czolgosz in Buffalo, N.Y.
• 1906: San Francisco earthquake leaves 500 dead or missing and destroys about 4 sq. mi of the city.

1910-1919:

• 1914–1918: World War I: U.S. enters World War I, declaring war on Germany and Austria-Hungary, three years after conflict began in 1914. Armistice ending World War I is signed in 1918.
• 1918: Worldwide influenza epidemic strikes; by 1920, nearly 20 million are dead. In U.S., 500,000 perish.

1920-1929:

• 1929: Herbert Hoover is inaugurated as the 31st president. Stock market crash precipitates the Great Depression.

1930-1939:

• The Great Depression continues.

1940-1949:

• 1941-1945: U.S. enters World War 2 when Japan attacks Hawaii, Guam, and the Philippines. U.S. declares war on Japan. Germany and Italy declare war on the United States; U.S. reciprocates by declaring war on both countries. Allies invade France on D-Day.
• 1945: U.S. drops atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.

1950-1959:

• 1950–1953 Korean War: Cold war conflict between Communist and non-Communist forces on Korean Peninsula. North Korean communists invade South Korea. President Truman, without the approval of Congress, commits American troops to battle.
• 1950-1975: Vietnam War: Prolonged conflict between Communist forces of North Vietnam, backed by China and the USSR, and non-Communist forces of South Vietnam, backed by the United States.
• 1954: Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy accuses army officials, members of the media, and other public figures of being Communists during highly publicized hearings.

1960-1969:

• 1961: U.S. severs diplomatic relations with Cuba. John F. Kennedy is inaugurated as the 35th president. Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba fails.
• 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis: President Kennedy denounces Soviet Union for secretly installing missile bases on Cuba and initiates a naval blockade of the island.
• 1963: President Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Tex. He is succeeded in office by his vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson.
• 1965: State troopers attack peaceful demonstrators led by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., as they try to cross bridge in Selma, Ala.
• In six days of rioting in Watts, a black section of Los Angeles, 35 people are killed and 883 injured.
• 1968: Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated in Memphis, Tenn. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated in Los Angeles, Calif.

1970-1979:

• 1970: Four students are shot to death by National Guardsmen during an antiwar protest at Kent State University.
• 1972: Five men, all employees of Nixon’s reelection campaign, are caught breaking into rival Democratic headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, DC
• 1973: Vice President Spiro T. Agnew resigns over charges of corruption and income tax evasion. President Nixon nominates Gerald R. Ford as vice president. Ford is confirmed by Congress and sworn in.
• 1974: House Judiciary Committee recommends to full House that Nixon be impeached on grounds of obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. Nixon resigns.
• 1979: Iranian students storm U.S. embassy in Teheran and hold 66 people hostage; 13 of the hostages are released.

1980-1989:

• 1980: FBI’s undercover bribery investigation, code named Abscam, implicates a U.S. senator, seven members of the House, and 31 other public officials.
• 1980: U.S. mission to rescue hostages in Iran is aborted after a helicopter and cargo plane collide at the staging site in a remote part of Iran and 8 servicemen are killed.
• 1981: Ronald Reagan is inaugurated as the 40th president. President Reagan is shot in the chest by John Hinckley, Jr.
• 1986: Space shuttle Challenger explodes 73 seconds after liftoff, killing all seven crew members.
• 1986: U.S. bombs military bases in Libya in effort to deter terrorist strikes on American targets. Iran-Contra scandal breaks when White House is forced to reveal secret arms-for hostages deals.
• 1989: Oil tanker Exxon Valdez runs aground in Prince William Sound, spilling more than 10 million gallons of oil.

1990-1999:

• 1990: Iraqi troops invade Kuwait, leading to the Persian Gulf War
• 1991: Persian Gulf War: U.S. leads international coalition in military operation (code named ―Desert Storm‖) to drive Iraqis out of Kuwait. Iraq accepts terms of UN ceasefire, marking an end of the war.
• 1992: The acquittal of four white police officers charged in the 1991 beating of black motorist Rodney King in Los Angeles sets off several days of rioting, leading to more than 50 deaths, thousands of injuries and arrests, and $1 billion in property damage.
• 1993: After 51-day standoff with federal agents, Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Tex., burns to the ground, killing 80 cult members.
• 1995: Bombing of federal office building in Oklahoma City kills 168 people.
• 1998: U.S. launches missile attacks on targets in Sudan and Afghanistan following terrorist attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. U.S. and Britain launch air strikes against weapons sites in Iraq.
• 1998: House of Representatives votes to impeach President Clinton on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
• 1999: School shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., leaves 14 students (including the 2 shooters) and 1 teacher dead and 23 others wounded.

2000-2009:

• 2000: No clear winner is declared in the close presidential election contest between Vice President Al Gore and Texas governor George W. Bush. More than a month after the presidential election, the U.S. Supreme Court rules against a manual recount of ballots in certain Florida counties, which it contends would violate the Constitution’s equal protection and due process guarantees. The decision provokes enormous controversy, with critics maintaining that the court has in effect determined the outcome of the election. Bush formally accepts the presidency, having won a slim majority in the electoral college but not a majority of the popular vote.
• 2001: Two hijacked jetliners ram twin towers of World Trade Center in worst terrorist attack against U.S.; a third hijacked plane flies into the Pentagon, and a fourth crashes in rural Pennsylvania. More than 3,000 people die in the attacks.
• 2003: Space shuttle Columbia explodes upon reentry into Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts on board.
• 2003: War waged by the U.S. and Britain against Iraq begins.
• 2004: Four hurricanes devastate Florida and other parts of the southern United States.
• 2005: Hurricane Katrina wreaks catastrophic damage on Mississippi and Louisiana; 80% of New Orleans is flooded. All levels of government are criticized for the delayed and inadequate response to the disaster.
• 2008: After months of unraveling, the economy finally comes crashing down in 2008, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbling 4.4% in one day, Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy, and Bush putting mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under government conservatorship.

2010-2019:

• 2010: An explosion and fire on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico sends millions of gallons of oil into the sea. The spill kills 11 and is the largest off-shore spill in U.S. history as well as one of the largest spills in world history.
• 2012: Adam Lanza, age 20, forces his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School, in Newtown, Connecticut, and kills 26 people, including 20 children between the ages of six and seven. Then Lanza takes his own life while still inside the school.
• 2013: Multiple bombs explode near the finish line of the Boston Marathon. Three people are killed and more than 170 people are injured.
• 2016: The 2016 election of Republican Donald Trump, whose campaign was grounded in nationalism and anti-immigrant rhetoric and largely viewed as a reaction to the seeming triumph of “blue” values during the two-term presidency (2009–17) of the United States’ first African American president, Barack Obama.
• 2019: The COVID-19 virus emerges and according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center in the United States has infected 22,099,794 people and caused the death of 372,051.

If you’re still with me, thank you, and here comes my why. My purpose in this rather long, nefarious bullet list is not to overwhelm or depress. Many monumental achievements and events happened along the way, and I will make a list of bright moments in a future post.

My purpose is to remind myself, and my readers of the importance of perspective. History is a collection of chronological time, and where humans are involved, it more often than not contains, war, pestilence and natural disasters. The past may not be reassuring but it does beg for our analysis, and acceptance.

It is only when we accept that we as human beings have always struggled to get along, stay healthy and protected (but mostly to get along) can we say to ourselves, how can I, as one person, try to be different? How can I take the lessons from our past and these repeated patterns and use them to shape who I want to be? And, mainly, how do I want my life to be reflected in the pages of history?

We have a way of looking back at the past with a sense of nostalgia. My mom always remembers “the 50s” as such a pleasant, carefree time. But guess what? The 50s were full of war, segregation, witch hunts and judgment. It just wasn’t yet in our living rooms and on our phones.

Does accepting that our history is full of darkness excuse the behavior? Not at all. But if we can accept that “this is the way,” of humans and history, we can at least be reassured that there is some sort of cycle that comes into play in our human existence. A type of organized chaos. A cycle of wounding and healing. Of dark moments with light in between. In looking at these dark times, we can trust and know that they ended when the light came.

These examples are marked by messes and mistakes, by failure and fatality. But not a single one ended the quest for something better, or ended our human striving as a whole. Sadly, these things happen, some would even say are normal…but not once have we been defeated by the dark times.

We call on our reserves of strength during times such as these. We escape into nature…turn off our screens (because our screens most often reflect what not to do or who not to be). And where do we go for examples of beauty and light? We walk out the door and step into the world that God created.

And we trust, armed with perspective, that this too, shall pass.