By one of those wonderful coincidences that make life so interesting, the book CONSCIENCE arrived in my mailbox today--Memorial Day--the day we set aside to commemorate and honor those who fought in the wars our country has waged over the years. (It's also a legal holiday and there was no mail delivery--except for this book.)

Written by Louisa Thomas, the book explores her great-grandfather's life and the beliefs that impacted his decisions over the years. Norman Thomas and his three brothers were raised in a religious home, but they each followed a path formed by his own conscience. At the beginning of World War I, Norman was a Presbyterian minister, but by the end of that terrible war, he had become a pacifist. One of his brothers was sentenced to prison for life because he was a conscientious objector. The other two brothers joined the military and served in that "war to end all wars."

Norman Thomas' book,THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR IN AMERICA, begins with this dedication:
"To the brave who went for conscience' sake to trench or prison." Although the four Thomas brothers often disagreed, they apparently came to respect one another's choices.

I've just begun reading CONSCIENCE, but already I feel a connection. the family in my book CALLAHAN CROSSROADS is divided over the right way to respond to Woodrow Wilson's call to serve in the war. The twelve-year-old narrator George begins to realize that things are not always black and white and that each person has to make an individual choice, according to what he or she thinks and believes.

I'm glad Louisa Thomas' book arrived on Memorial Day. Just the first few pages offer insights into conscience--how it's formed, how it changes and how it impacts our lives. It promises to be a thoughtful read.

The Better to See Life with

A few days ago, I sat with my sister and mother as we waited for our mother's cataract surgery. When the surgeon came in to talk with her about the surgery, she expressed some doubts about whether, at her age (97), she should go ahead with the procedure. He apparently hears this quite a lot and gave her time to ask questions, tell him how she felt, etc. He said it's never too late to replace cataracts and reminded her that he'd done the procedure on a 102-year-old man--someone considerably older than our mother.

He also related a story that impressed me even more than the 102-year-old. A man had been told that he had terminal cancer and was given 8 months to live. Just before that diagnosis he'd learned that he was a candidate for cataract replacement surgery. He decided to go ahead with the cataract procedure because, even though he might have only 8 months to live, he wanted to be able to see everything clearly--places he would travel, books he would read, people he would visit, etc. He didn't want to just live out his remaining time; he wanted to live with his eyes wide open. He wanted to look at life through a clear lens.

It's a choice we can make every day, with or without cataract surgery. We can open our eyes to life. We can see everything and everyone we encounter and revel in the wonderful variety and beauty of it all. Or we can look through a lens clouded with our own distortions and preconceptions of how life should be.