Frogtails…
Faces you remember.

Symbols

Today at work a black lady sent me a URL that pointed to a story about a school in West Virginia that was permitting a student to wear the Confederate flag. I read the article and wondered, why did she send this to me? Of course it dawned on me that she must be offended by it. I started to write her a reply along these lines.

I read the article. You sent the URL without comment, and yet… you sent it. It must have meaning to you. It doesn’t to me. When I see the confederate flag I “feel” nothing more than when I see a palm tree and beach advertising for Hawaii, or a snowflake on a mug advertising for Aspen, Colorado, or a Maple leaf representing all things Canadian. Even though the swastika symbol goes back some 3000 years, I’ll admit that that seeing a someone wearing one would evoke strong emotions in me.

At that point, I stopped writing and discarded the note. The point was made clear to me. I would “feel” bad if someone would wear one of those to work, to a wedding, or any number of occasions. I would notice it even if at the beach or on the street but I probably wouldn’t “feel” much in other situations. The point being, there are times and places where I would take offense at this symbol. Rather than thinking my colleague is overly sensitive, I suppose it fair to imagine that she finds the display of a confederate flag in a public school equally offensive.

Keep that story in mind a moment. Even though I don’t respond to the confederate flag, I can imagine now that others may. Now, I want to talk about a related topic. Those who know me realize pretty quickly that I am not superstitious. This is not to say that I feel something about superstitions and merely choose to ignore them. I really don’t feel anything or pay any attention to black cats, ladders, four leaf clovers, etc.

Later in the day I had to write a little code to trigger an event to happen on Monday, June 6, 2005. That is when it dawned on me. The numbers of that day next year are well known and have a lot of significance to a lot of people. It happens to be a Tuesday (same as 911). June 6 also happens to be the anniversary of D-Day. Just like the story above, even though that date has no particular meaning to me, I can imagine that it does to others. Myself, I’ll be taking that day off and hiding in the hills as far away from everthing as I can get. Such a tempting a date. Will the terrorists and lunatics be able to ignore it?

Here is a funny related thought: there will be children born on that day. I’d rather not have a grandchild with that for a birthdate. Do the math. :)

P.S. Anyone named Rosemary should be particulary wary.