Taking Things for Granted

We take so much for granted. We get up in the morning, flip a switch, lights come on, but one day a power outage robs us of our automatic reflexes. We sit in the dark, the furnace stops running, microwave buttons do nothing, and cell phones lay dead. Daily habits must wait on hold while we wait for a surge of power. Luckily, the situation does return to normal. I hope the stock market returns to normal again after its latest nosedive. I’d started taking its record highs for granted.

It’s easy though to think of times when it doesn’t. We attended a recent program featuring the retired national park superintendent Gerard Baker who left me with an unsettled feeling when he said, “My generation never got to see the river bottom.” This Mandaree Indian, born and raised on the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota, was speaking of that consequence when Garrison Dam backed up the waters of the Missouri River and formed Lake Sakakawea. Three little towns - Elbowoods, Sanish, and Van Hook - disappeared under the rising water. Their old way of life could no longer be taken for granted.

Some white ranchers also lived on the land and worked harmoniously beside the Indians only to suffer the same fate. So it was that the Voigt family went looking for new land and found a ranch, the Anchor Ranch established by William V. Wade, for their operation south of Raleigh, North Dakota. Their herd of cattle needed to be moved to that new ground, and the decision was made to drive them overland. After 10 1/2 days on the trail, the herd arrived at their new home on the Cannonball River.

In our household we often read stories about the political turmoil caused by cruel regimes in Europe. I recently purchased the new book by Erik Larson, “The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz” which looks at Churchill’s first year as prime minister of England. Bound and determined, he would not give in to Hitler’s efforts to make England surrender to his threats. Instead, as prime minister he marshaled efforts to resist and maintain their identity. Hitler took it for granted he could easily defeat the English by sending over waves of bombers to destroy the country bit by bit until he forced a surrender.

While the bombs rained down and buildings crumbled, Churchill’s action-oriented speeches and defiant stance rallied his countrymen to stand and fight. English factories went into hyper-production building weapons to answer the Germans with, being especially successful in their production of Spitfire fighter planes which rose to unravel so many flights of German bombers. Churchill wanted the country to survive until he could entice the United States to enter the war, something he took for granted would happen. It was during this period he uttered his now famous words, “Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few.”

To finish on a lighter note, I think my old custom combining boss was taking memories of wheat fields in Kansas for granted when he recently joked, “Lynn, should we get some combines and head south in May?” I answered, “Ha, ha, been there, done that.” He finished, “Well, I can still dream.” And there’s nothing wrong with dreaming, I remember the story about the 90 year old man who went out and bought a Corvette to impress the ladies.