Tense times

The gift of friendship from many people has enhanced my life, but of them, three men are a limestone wall around the castle of my life.  All three live within fifteen miles.  One I seldom get to spend time with, one I see almost daily.  The third guy I get to connect with even less frequently even though he lives only a mile and a half away.

It is this third guy, almost fifteen years my junior who invited me over for coffee last Friday before he left for work.  We had a short hour together.  Of the three, we are the closest in personality match.  That’s my opinion; it may not be his.  The most significant difference between us is his insane devotion to the University of Alabama sports.  His “Tide” is always rolling!

I no longer remember what got us into assessing the condition of the word that morning, but he uses the word “tense” to describe the state of our nation.  That spoken word sprang from his mind and latched onto mine.  Thinking about the experience at this moment, I visually see the scene from the first “Alien” movie where the egg erupted with a creature latching on to the face of the explorer.

This writing is now twenty-four plus hours later, and I am still pondering his one-word description of our populist.  When a word grabs me like this, I go to Google and want to know where the term came from, its etymology.  Here is what I found from etymonline.com; the word first used in the 1660s.  It came from Latin tensus, which is the past participle of tendere meaning to “stretch, extend.”  That word comes from the PIE root “ten- “to stretch.”  (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIE_root)

I had a hard time with “PIE root.”  I only know of two pies, one with fruit and the other has something to do with math.  So I had to look up what PIE stood for; Proto-Indo-European language.  Of that, I only understand “European.”  PIEs are fundamental parts of words that carry a lexical meaning, so-called morphemes, like to “eat” or “run.”  Three is more, but I have already overextended my writing beyond my understanding.

I think he is right about our nation, particularly displayed by three houses of Government.  I am old enough to remember the Cold War threat of nuclear war with Russia. Six houses down from where I lived in Chester, Virginia, a neighbor installed a “fallout shelter” underground in his back yard.  Life then was tense.  Today the most significant tension seems to be coming not from outside our nation but from within it.  There is no “fallout shelter” stout enough or buried deep enough to survive the fallout of this tension.

 As you remember from science class, stretching something stores up energy.  I know this by attempting to convince a tree trunk to release its grip on the earth.  I tied a rope around the stump and them to the back bumper of my truck.  The rope became tense until it just gave up and snapped.  One end came flying by my truck window and cracked like a whip just past my nose.  Stored up energy will do one of two things to rid itself of the strain, break or release productively.  Noting good happens when stress causes a failure.  Stress controlled can have an advantage by doing work for us.  One way or another stored up tension will eventually be released, either destructively or constructively.

Tension is nothing new; it came into existence as a result of the Fall.  Just read Genesis 3:17-29 and 4:13-14.  Nor do we need to look further than our Bible to find a means to release the tension.   Do a word search in your Bible for “peace” just in the New Testament.  One of my go-to places for peace is searching the words “peace of God.”

I have written enough for today.  However, my mind continues to chart a course through chasing after this thought.  I trust yours does too. 

Happy pondering!

Photo – A tree in northern Kurdistan.