L.etting O.thers V.oluntarily E.volve

I suffer from slogaphilia. I admit it. I'm not ashamed and I don't wish to retract the statement. "What on earth is 'slogaphilia' you ask? Well, it's a word I made up, but it means that I love slogans. I read every bumper sticker, every T-shirt, every belt buckle, every sign I happen to see.

This evening while driving the northbound 80, a young man wearing a maroon colored T-shirt, boarded my bus. Emblazoned on the front of his shirt in stacked block print were the letters

L

O

V

E

What followed each letter was the true message of the shirt.

Letting

Others

Voluntarily

Evolve

I thought about Darwin and his theories of evolution as well as natural selection and wondered about the slogan's origin.

When I got home, I Googled the phrase but could find nothing on the web with these four words occurring together.

In further ruminations about the slogan, it came to me that this was one man's way of shirking his responsibility to fellow human beings. A selfish modality that pretends to recognize everyone's individualism, but in truth, withdraws from any collective responsibility. While he might think that this is a safe plane, there is danger in this philosophy. If all people thought this way, who would there then be to help steer him, or others, clear of harm's way?

Surely we are not our brother's keepers, BUT (and a big BUT it is) our life experiences can and indeed MUST serve as guideposts along the trail not yet traveled by those who follow. As much as we would like to at times, we can't grab a person and force our history into their will and thus into their reality. However, the lessons we've learned must be passed along so that those who have an ear to hear, will do so.

As my father was fond of saying, "A word to the wise is sufficient, but a fool never learns."