To the editor:
God bless Donald Trump. Please allow me to explain.
The older I get I find myself receiving happiness and pleasure from the most simple of events. To me, there’s nothing more pleasurable than driving to town in the summertime and crossing the Fort Fairfield Bridge and watching the kids, young and old, swimming in the Aroostook River at the boat landing. Tradition I guess, it’s what I did at the local brook with my friends when I was a kid, it’s what Gloria and I allowed with our children and now our grandchildren at the same brook. At the boat landing all they need now is a rope swing but don’t build it for them, let them build it and they will respect it more. it’s a great pleasure to watch children make their own fun. Tradition I guess.
Two weeks ago had the great gift of following a Caribou school bus on the River Road. As the bus stopped to let the students return home I noticed some common traits. It was 10 degrees and the younger children would get off the bus with their mittens hanging from a thread of yarn that went up one sleeve across the back and down the other sleeve. Their jackets were undone, their hats in hand, boots unlaced and they all were dragging their book bags behind them in the snow. You could tell the difference between the boys and girls only by the colors of their outfits.
From stop to stop I watched the unloading of our students and they all had that same type of walk, the type of slow, carefree walk that only a child has that projects not a worry in the world. Impatient adults might wish they would hurry up, but this day I went from stop to stop laughing and receiving one of the best Christmas presents of this year. A simple thing I guess.
But I have to say one of the best gifts of this year was the many Merry Christmas greetings that our farm family received from customers visiting at the farm. Also the many Merry Christmas greetings that people were giving and receiving while around town, you could hear it everywhere. I know it’s a simple thing, I knew it to be a traditional thing, but it made me feel both pleasure and happiness.
When discussing this issue with a customer he told me it was a result of the Trump effect. I believe America has some difficult challenges ahead, some internal and some external to our country. Trump’s “Thank You” tour always included a banner that read “Merry Christmas” — it was a simple message, as simple as watching children get off the school bus or swimming in a God-given gift, the river. What a simple message, “Make America Great Again” and it can be the start for solving our country’s difficult issues. Like me, Donald Trump can be brash and rude, but it’s not the man that I follow, it’s the idea that America can be great, and that we as a people can be proud of our nation’s greatness without offending others.
We are an exceptional country because of God’s blessings, whoever He or She is. Our greatness can grow with tradition and something as simple as our leaders saying “Merry Christmas” everyone.
We have a political system not of God but of man. We all have faults, we all need prayer. So with that I say “God bless you, Donald Trump,” with today’s government you will need all the blessings He has to offer. We can all use His blessings.
A belated “Merry Christmas” to all, a “Happy Hanukkah” everyone and a “Happy Ramadan.” In my simplistic faith walk, one conclusion I have derived is that it might surprise you who you meet in Heaven. You might run into a Donald Trump.
“Farmer’ Mark Goughan
Caribou
