What to write about this month? I’m back in Michigan writing this from the apartment above my motorcycle shop.
Barb and I have been good friends with our landlords for many years now and whenever I’m back in town I have an open invite to stay here. It has a very organic space (its organic because it just happened naturally, you could never design this into a home) and seating area that is filled with so many great memories of the four of us eating takeout and drinking wine, that it makes for a great place to write.
I thoroughly intended to write about the contrast in my two worlds (which I will save for October), but I happened to watch a documentary movie on the plane about Joe Cocker and his Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour. Actually, it’s about a reunion in 2015 with the surviving members, including Leon Russell, of that 1970 US tour. The theme was Joe’s song, Space Captain, in which the line Learning to Live Together is prominent. Which I thought was a great theme of this month’s article being that it is election season.
I’m constantly asked in the coffee shop what side I belong to? I’m a right or left? I always answer with the same, “I’m Switzerland!” “I have a business to run, and politics can never be part of that!” Barb and I pride ourselves that Hava Java is open to the whole community. It does not matter where you stand politically; you are welcome here. But still they try to drag it out of me, “Come on man, you can’t possible agree with them, that or this!” So, then I tell them my political elevator speech. I learned a long time ago if you’re going to be in business or sales, you need an “elevator speech.” If you get on an elevator, and you only have a few minutes to tell someone what you do or sell before the door opens and they walk away, what would you say? It’s your elevator speech.
So here is my political elevator speech (which, by the way, is my core belief ). “We have become so divided in this country, you have to be either right or left. No in-between! If we would just take the time to listen to the other person, really listen, and learn their concerns. You will find that you have more in common with them than we have differences.” But let’s be real, most people need that divide. They thrive on it. Which is sad, and I truly feel sorry for them.
My sister-in-law Brenda passed away a few years back, and we were on completely different sides of the political spectrum. But when I asked her what she was really concerned about, we found that we both agreed with each other. We had different ways to get there, but we both wanted the same things. I truly miss those conversations, of which there were many. She was usually cooking dinner for us, and she would ask, “Tim, what do you think of —?” We never got mad or shut the other person off. We just listened to each other. She was my friend.
We have hosted the local Democratic party events as well as meet and greewith conservative office holders. They come in, have their meeting, spend a lot of money and go away. So, to end this, as per Joe Cocker, in his song Space Captain, “We are learning to live together!”
So, your homework this month is to listen to and read the words to Space Captain. It will change your outlook. If it does not, then I feel sorry for you.
Hava Java Mesa is located at the northeast corner of Power and McDowell roads in The Village at Las Sendas, 2849 N. Power Road, Suite 103, in Mesa.