The word that translates in every language…

It’s been awhile. A long while. I’ve been thinking about you lovingly. Starting to write again. Where to begin? And then today happened. And I’m bubbling over. My family is in Rome. We are on a 9 country, 14 city, 67 day world tour (#9country14city67days on Instagram to check it out!)  We have a lovely little apartment, and a wonderful community that has embraced us with (italian speaking) open arms. Interestingly, we find far less English speakers in Italy than in Bali or Thailand… Go figure. But oh, the food and the people are SO amazing.

However, where ever we go – Bali, Australia, Thailand, Norway, Italy we hear a lot of strange and interesting words and sounds, and as soon as they realize we are American we hear the same word repeated over and over… Trump?  I mean, what can you say? You can simply shrug and laugh and nod and keep ordering your pizza. And then, this morning, against all odds, he won.

Today, as I walked the streets of Rome, purchasing art supplies for the kids and fresh mozzarella (ok, and a bottle of wine… I mean I am coming from Bali, the land of NO decent wine…and it is election day) I see people looking at me as I speak my broken Italian, and whispering. And I hear the words through the chatter,….english… americano…. Trump…. And I feel my cheeks burn with humiliation. I want to tell them I’m sorry. I’m sorry he said mean things. Awful things. He sounds like a real jerk. I know.

And what do you tell your children?

And as I was drinking my profoundly awesome Cappuccino I remembered this quote:

And I wonder, what if we all stopped thinking of all of the awful things this man has said and done. I mean, he’s the president now, so what’s the point obsessing about all the bad stuff. What if we just sent him blessings? What if we focused on all of his positives, the reason so many people believed in him? His business experience. The fact he is not touched by politics. What if we forgive him his ego, and remember we have all said stupid things in the spotlight. We have all been a little ego drunk at times and woke up sick about something that came out all wrong? I mean, what harm could it do to find a little forgiveness?  What is possible, if we all chose to see the most beautiful parts of this man? What could it turn into? What if we chose to create a miracle? All of us, together?

I surely don’t know the answers. But it seems like there is already an abundance of fear. I can feel the tidal wave from Italy. What if we all just switched to the vibration of love? What is possible?

We arrive in America on November 19. I’m afraid of the fear. So, I choose love. I will teach my children forgiveness and love. I will focus on all of this man’s most positive attributes and I will trust in a bright future.

Yes, it will be harder for some of us than others. But we are strong people, we can do hard things.  At least for a few moments in time, who knows, maybe we can change the world? Maybe we can create something beautiful and magical, that sounds like forgiveness, and looks like hope?

Never hurts to try to find the Sunshine…because what if? What if it worked?

xoxo