Each of us has a tale to tell about labor in general, and of Labor Day in particular. We know it as a day of celebration, one set aside on the first Monday of September to honor the labor movement here in America, or a similar day in any of more than 80 countries around the world. Behind the holiday trappings it is a day in which we honor the gift of turning ideas and visions into realities. It is one thing to look upon a landscape and to visualize an organized flow of traffic, complete with bridges, highways, lodging, restaurants, and people all joined together living compatibly and harmoniously; but it also is an acknowledgement that it will take a lot of skilled labor to put all the pieces together before we all might enjoy the final product. The final product has lasting power. It is what we see, hear, touch, smell, and like or dislike for decades and longer. It is our tribute to ideas, to engineering, and to the workmanship of each other. And of course, it is also equally about women.
The labor movement itself has been recast by many in a political context—in praise or condemnation—depending on the speaker’s motivation. Setting aside the hundreds of stories that could be told about political shenanigans, I prefer to concentrate instead on the beauty and the gift of working as a fulfillment of mind-to-hand collaboration, the simplicity of doing as a calling, and the honor of living a life in tribute to the joy of contribution at all levels of human achievement.
The word labor connotes hard work. But the term “hard work” adds little to the conversation because that concept also is thought of as all brawn and no brains. How wrong could anyone be? It is hard work to put your shoulder to a brick wall and push for hours on it in hopes to knocking it down. But it requires more brain power and less physical work to knock it over in seconds with the right tools. At such times a skilled craftsman is a sight to behold. He or she is anything but “brute force.”
The ability to play the piano well is also many quantum levels beyond difficult work. We see hand-to-eye coordination; we do not see many years of study, or natural talent, or innovation, or the unity of mind, body, and soul when Clair de Lune or the Music of the Night is played while an entire audience is held spellbound by the magic of imagination, creation, and the myriad skills that are all blended together in making a joyous moment happen that we never forget it. We rarely praise such moments on Labor Day, but we could.
Some disunity is misinformed unity. A friend was miscast as a supervisor. He was such a nice guy that he could be taken advantage of quite easily, especially by women. But he is the only person I ever met who could crawl under an automobile with just an adjustable wrench and disassemble it in minutes. How he managed such a feat is far beyond my abilities to even write about, so limited is my own mechanical aptitude. Another acquaintance was a skilled pilot who owned and flew his own twin engine plane. On the job as a crew chief he could not organize a rest period effectively. Another excelled as a high ranking military officer, as a fighter pilot, and at the highest levels in the space program. He failed at politics and as CEO of his own company. My point is that we all possess different skills; nobody has them all. It is the harmonious blending of skills that “makes things happen.” And it is in that spirit that we find the highest union of minds over matter, unity over dissention, and peace, love, and understanding over hate.
But today also kicks off the political season in America. It is our last chance to acknowledge peace, love, and understanding as a common purpose until the elections are history. The psychological need for power will rear its ugly head, while those who seek political office will do their best to show us they are not qualified to serve in the same positions they seek, for which millions of dollars will be wasted in their pursuits, and tens of thousands of words will be twisted and torn asunder in lies and half-truths.
Somewhere, out there, a young mind or two will emerge, and each will house a sparkling voice, a discerning eye, and a heart of gold. And some day down the road, he or she will see the challenges, formulate the vision, and articulate the goals that will raise our spirits and take us back to those glorious moments in time when we pulled together to produce something worthy of ourselves.
Let us celebrate now before the next sniper comes along.
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