Mind Your Marks

humansofnewyork:

Not sure that I’ve ever been so honored to introduce someone as I am right now.

Gac Filipaj is a refugee from the former Yugoslavia. For the past twelve years, he has worked as a janitor for Columbia University.  His job title is “Heavy Cleaner,” which includes emptying the trash and cleaning the toilets. 

During this time, he worked until 11pm every night during the week.  After his shift concluded, he would start studying.  This weekend, after twelve years of study, Gac graduated from Columbia University with a Classics degree.  Rarely have so many qualities I admire been wrapped up in a single person.

carmonday:

Ferrari F599 GTO

(via ryanjay)

On Courage

I wonder what it takes for a person to be courageous.

If we think back to some events in history, what did it take individuals to do what they did and would I have the same fortitude to do that as well.

Could you rise up with fellow passengers and take on hijackers, knowing full well that your actions will bring the plane down?

What about stand in front of a tank in Tienanmen Square?

Could you charge off a landing craft onto the beaches at Normandy?

It’s easy to say, “Hell yeah! I’d take on those terrorists! God bless ‘Merica!” sitting on my couch watching the latest episode of Dancing with the Stars.

But if I’m honest, really honest with myself, I’d have to say, “I don’t know.” Do any of us know what we would do? I wonder, how many people, while they’re waiting for their flight glance around at otherpassengers and try to gage threats.

Humans like to prepare themselves. We play out scenarios in our mind working out our reaction. Then, if that happens, we know what to do. Rarely do situations play out was we thought they would, whether it’s as simple as a conversation with a partner or an attack.

Of course, there are levels of courage. It’s one thing to step forward and say your boss is breaking the law and something completely different to stand in front of a tank. One could be the end of your career at your company, the end of your life with the other.

I was thinking about this because the other day, I was watching a movie about a very courageous woman, Sophie Scholl. It also turns out she was born on this day, back in 1921.

If you’re not familiar with her, I highly recommend the movie Sophie Scholl: The Final Days, it’s in German with subtitles or the book Sophie Scholl: The Woman who Defied Hitler by Frank McDonough (it’s available as an ebook).

Sophie was a leading member of the Nazi resistance group known as The White Rose. The group was made up of Munich university students and their philosophy professor. The movement was notably non-violent and philosophical, producing six fliers that were distributed around Munich and Bavaria.

Today, we take the right to peaceful assembly as a given right, although, as the recent Occupy Movement has shown us, authority has ways to discourage that right. The students in Berkeley who were pepper sprayed showed extreme courage to protect their rights and their message.

In her time, Sophie and the other members of The White Rose demonstrated extreme courage because the result of getting caught was almost certain death. There were many things you did not do, if you were in Germany during the Nazi regime, one of them being speaking out against Hitler.

Would you be willing to help distribute those fliers?

What most people want is a chance to live their life with the ability to grow better. But the reality is that we are cajoled into our pens by others, government or religion. And it takes an extraordinary group of individuals to stop, stand up and try to break out of those prisons.

To bring freedom and decency to their fellow citizens.

Most times, those folks will never survive the fights, but if they have lit the pilot light under enough people, their cause will carry through to the end.

In the end, Sophie and five other members of The White Rose were beheaded. But their message sustained. The sixth flier was smuggled out of Germany where the Allies edited it and dropped thousands of them over Germany.

It is unknown what Sophie’s last words actually were. Most believe they were: …your heads will fall as well. There is some debate whether Sophie said those words or her brother, Hans, said them.

It is known that with his head in the guillotine, Hans said: Es lebe die Freiheit!

Long live Freedom.

But even if we aren’t fermenting a revolution or standing up to the Gestapo, our own little battles require courage. A liberal raised in a conservative house. A gay person coming out. A single mother raising a child. We should support those finding their own voice at a challenging time and offer the strength they need to continue their fight.

Because, at times, we will all need a little courage.

Reposted from Facebook.

I remember this view. It’s hard to believe that it’s been 16 years. 

I sat with my arms wrapped around a girl I truly cared about. “I’ll give you the world,” I promised her. Our soft words frozen in the cold January air whipping past us.

Friends wonder why I never dwell on the past. Most don’t even know about this part of my life. I rarely talk about the past because of this view. Perhaps, subconsciously, to see it again was why I went back to a town I haven’t been in for all these years. 

We were engaged. But by this time, that had chilled colder than the marble bench we sat on. The Washington Monument towered above us, just 15 feet behind us. Our eyes looking at the most powerful house in the world.

She was struggling with more powerful feelings, her heart fighting between me and another. I may not have had much at that point, but I told her I would do whatever I needed to. She leaned in close to me as the wind curled around us.

Things went for the worse.

I hoped she would make a decision. Either way.

One evening, we stood on the train platform that would take her home. I looked deep into her soul. “Just tell me if he’s the one you want to be with.”

“I don’t know,” she said softly. The train was called for final boardings. She hugged me deeper. “Just tell me,” I whispered into her ear. She looked at me for a moment, turned and boarded the train.

I don’t know what she thought about as the train pulled away from the station. I watched it disappear around the bend. And watched the empty track for what seemed like forever before turning and walking through the station and back to my house.

I never talked to her again.

She eventually got married, which I know is what she really wanted.

I went on to see the world, alone. 

In the end, I made the decision to end it.

I wish she would have. If she had told me that she picked him, it would have hurt, but deep down, I would have understood and come to accept it.

But by not giving me that, it has hurt infinitely more. I was left with the question of asking myself if I misread her signals. Was she just waiting for me to do something. Did I fail in that aspect?

Closure sucks, not having it kills a little bit of you.

Eventually time eases the pain. You learn to stop questioning yourself and to push the memory deeper into your past. You move on, but you’re never the same. I know I am not the same person I was before I met her.

They say you only remember the good times.

They lie, because I remember that view.

emergentfutures:

Paul Higgins: So true and so funny

tastefullyoffensive:

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