Parade of Life

Street Fair, USA, starting with a parade which seems almost metaphorical: We line up in the high school parking, a place practically synonymous with the true starting point of life.  We are freezing and we are warm; our comfort levels change minute to minute depending on how we are dressed and from which corners the wind suddenly sneaks around to hit us full in the face.Thanks to the school Marching Bands, there is a sound track to the parade, just as there must surely be a sound track to our lives that we will one day hear, perhaps in that last moment when we start to rise and for the first time see our life whole, flying low over the lovely long stretch of it.We do not march for more than 40 minutes and yet there are incidents: A dozen dogs accompany an organization called "Canine Care" that brings animals  into nursing homes to cheer the residents  and one, an elderly bulldog, is pulled along  in a  child’s wagon – until 20 minutes in, that is, when it tumbles out and lies helpless before the man pulling it even realizes and hurries back to take it up in his arms. In eerie human parallel, a man standing on one of the floats falls from it, landing hard on the asphalt and cannot rise; cannot rise at all.  “Call 911!” “Call 911!” The sound ripples through the crowd. But a police officer on his motorcycle is nearby and we see him accelerate even as he summons help on his radio. Then, “Go around! Just go around!” someone is heard to say, and, a bit stunned, we do go around and keep on marching.Below are a few seconds of this march, featuring four of the seven young men I love very much and work with as this year’s Vice President of Winchester ABC, along with President Jennifer, seen stepping along life’s road with all the zest the enthusiasm she is known for. A slice then, just a tiny slice of that Parade we all march in every minute whether or not we know it:[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98RZKMYIucM]