My Inaugural Day Walk

   As Barack Obama formally began his second term as President of the United States today, time seemed to stop temporarily for the morning's at once solemn and joyous occasion. The nation's leaders set aside ugly politics and petty bickering to share, along with thousands of onlookers crowding the Capitol Mall,  the Obama family's celebratory moment as he took his oath of office. Using the historically significant Bible belonging to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., Obama spoke his promise to preserve, protect and defend the U.S. Constitution  as his wife and daughters stood by his side. Later in another proud and historic tradition, Obama and his stunning wife, First Lady Michelle Obama, stepped out of the vehicle in which they rode in the Inaugural Parade and walked along Pennsylvania Avenue on a crisp, bright afternoon in Washington, D.C. I thrilled at watching the nationally televised broadcast of all the pomp and circumstance, grateful and excited and proud to take part in my own way from so far away.
  I continued to savor the significance as I took my own Inaugural Day walk along the sea wall in Carlsbad, California, 12 short miles from where I live. As I strode along the familiar path I often take to exercise my dogs, I made a conscious effort to notice my surroundings.
  I noticed children playing in the sand, couples holding hands and whispering to one another, athletes running and biking, surfers,  occasional musicians, sun worshippers, readers, gazers at waves and an endless horizon. I noticed bees buzzing through purple statice, gulls scavenging for food scraps and pelicans swooping along the shoreline. Here a man sat at a cement bench while he ate a fast-food meal and checked his cell phone. There some technicians from a local electronics company leaned against their truck as they took a cigarette break along the oceanfront. Here a mother pushed her twin babies along the sidewalk in their stroller. There a child on a scooter whizzed through the pedestrian traffic, despite the "no skateboards, roller blades or scooters" signs posted along the way.
  This is the Carlsbad Inauguration Day Parade. This is part of the America over which Obama presides. This is a part of the America our soldiers fight to protect. This is part of the America that allows the  driver of a vehicle freedom to proclaim in signs painted all over the car "USA BECOMING A SOCIETY OF ENTITLED" and "COLLEGE IS BIG BUSINESS WASTE OF MONEY."
  All of it, even in its magnificence, reminds me of the small window through which I see the world. While a child plays in the sand here, another child in a distant land cowers from debris crashing around him after a bomb explodes nearby. While some delight in falling in love, others despair in the bitterness of divorce. While a runner sprints to prepare for a marathon, a wounded soldier learns to walk on a prosthetic leg. While a newborn enters the world, an elder passes into another realm. While someone prays, another blasphemes. While sun shines, snow falls. It is beyond my comprehension.
  And so, in my minute portion of life on this planet, I do solemnly swear to uphold and preserve the life and wellbeing of that which I encounter each day.