In defense of PRIDE

Looking very strange...and very blue...while volunteering
with the Long Island Pride Parade in 2006.

June 29, 2014
           Day 60

Today's reflection will be short, but purposeful. 
(I almost wrote poignant, but let's face it, that's an awful lot to hope for, especially in so few lines!)

Pride is usually considered a bad thing, and you see it grouped among the seven deadly sins (along with lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, sloth, and avarice).  But when you're proud of your children or grandchildren, do you feel sinful?  When you're proud of your pets for behaving well with strangers, or proud of your husband or wife for an accomplishment at work, do you feel you've done something wrong, something deadly?  Of course not!

The word pride is a misnomer, and in relation to so-called sin, it means something more like ego than natural, positive pride in a job well done.  Ego though?  Yeah, ego gets the better of us all, myself certainly, and we have good reason to keep that in check, whether or not we attach the word sin to it.  But pride is not ego!

TODAY, I'm marching with my partner Andy down 5th Avenue in New York City.  We're marching in the New York City PRIDE Parade, not the New York City EGO Parade. 

Today is about pride in our ancestors and elders who didn't have the rights we now enjoy.  It's about pride in ourselves for how far we have come: I'm only 39, but even just 10 or 15 years ago, I'd have never guessed I'd see the world we now have!  And it's about pride in our young people, and hoping with optimism that the world they're growing up in will continue to be much easier on them than it was on us. 

PRIDE is a good thing!  And today, this day right here, I have so much of it, I'm gonna let the whole world know how grateful I am for all my blessings and joys!