Loyalty

Yesterday I ran into an old friend that I haven't seen in about a year. He was in a lot of emotional pain and confusion. His wife of many years has divorced him. Here he is in his 50s put out on his own and being forced to create a new life for himself. It doesn't take a psychic to see the fear and hurt in his eyes. In our society divorce has become almost a right of passage for a man.

Our education system and our religions have so betrayed us by failing to teach us men how to be a husband and a father. We are expected to learn that from our parents. This is all well and good if one grew up in a household where we were given a good example as a role model. But so many of us do not come from that sort of home. We are left to blunder our way through marriage and family life.

In this anti family environment of a dying society the concept of marriage is no longer till death do you part, it has become more like, until I am no longer getting what I want out of it, we part. Society has come from a place where divorce was a rarity to where the happy marriage is a rarity. There is a lonely restlessness as we seek that illusive prey, the fantasy relationship that will bring us bliss and happiness. We the uncommitted to anything but self-seeking are looking for someone who will be committed to making us happy. The result is our relationships are not much more than temporary dwellings. Partners are discarded when they cease to amuse us and judging from the length of today's average marriage, amusement lasts about three to five years.

It seems that we as a people no longer understand the concept of loyalty. That is loyalty to anything but ourselves. Loyalty is gone from our world of commerce. It is gone from our workplace's and it is almost completely gone from our relationships and our families. In this vacuum of loyalty, life has become dangerous, for our children, our relationships, and ourselves.

I find it curious that we hear a lot about love today and almost nothing of loyalty, because in truth loyalty is love in action and in deed. So is all this love we hear about truly love or is it no more than the lust to have what we want when we want it and for so long as it amuses us. (Loyalty: 1. steadfast in allegiance. 2:faithful to a person , ideal or custom.)