There’s the rain, the cold, and the million mile stretch to January pay day all at play here. But the reality of Donald Trump’s inauguration taking place at the end of the week was enough to make anyone less than willing to get out of bed this morning. We feel you.
On a more uplifting note though, over on the other side of the pond today also marks Martin Luther King day. The holiday falls on the third Monday of January each year to commemorate King’s birthday on the 15th. Whether you're in the US of A or not right now though, there's something that we can all take from this particular American holiday, and that's the ever so timely words of wisdom of from the man himself:
‘We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.’ Martin Luther King Jr.
I’m sure that many of us can relate to the prospect of finite disappointment a little more than infinite hope right now. But in light of what the world is bracing itself for once Donald Trump officially becomes the President of the United States of America this Friday, there’s nothing more valuable than hope right now.
Maybe it’s fate, maybe it’s just the way the dates work out, but it really feels all the more prominent that this year’s celebration of one of the most prominent names in racial equality and civil rights falls in the same week as Donald Trump - the man who cancelled his Martin Luther King day visit to the Smithsonian Museum of African American History and Culture a day after engaging in a Twitter fallout with hugely respected civil rights figure, Congressman John Lewis - is due to be sworn in as president.
I don't know about you but I still haven't fully accepted that Trump's presidency is A Thing. I know that it's going to happen. The date has been set. People are making plans. He's tweeting all the tweets. But if I'm being honest, I intentionally haven't let it sink in.
But today, on Martin Luther King Day, we need to remember that we do still have a choice about how to deal with these shitty and inevitable things. To use his words, it's just a disspointment that we need to accept. I don't want to, but I will. Because dissapointment isn't forever, and that's pretty damn comforting. And infinite hope? Well, there's never a bad time to embrace the positivity thing.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.