Greetings friend, and let us give praise! Every road in Oxford is built, and all lead to happy homes and fruitful businesses. Everyone who was hungry is now fed; every senseless crime prosecuted and laid to rest. A perfect green grows on both sides of every fence, and all disagreements have found resolution.
What now is left for us to do but ponder Utopia?
We are blessed here, and I give thanks — that all things are sound and in their proper places and our leaders may now grapple (for us all) a higher state of being, a hometown free of any semblance of human imperfection or moral weakness.
Only in our fair town, where every municipal project is paid for and every building and park completed do we have time to fill our dockets with the deeper debates, like how many kegs can one minor float; and if a person smoked in the woods, with no one around to be offended, would he still be crushed by a falling tree?
Sometimes, when the message gets too loud, it’s best to turn the volume down. Let us not forget how good we have it here. Oxford life is easy; it is we who make it hard. When did live and let live become confusing?
Only in a place so perfect and complete, free of fears, worries, or crime, do we have time to invent new ones. We may all sleep soundly knowing that our leaders’ jobs are done, and they are free now to wipe civic agendas (like dangerous intersections, weak infrastructure, or falling buildings) from the table, in pursuit of loftier public goals: how to live without dying and how to celebrate without champagne. —Finally, the job merits the public-funded salary…
Friend, there are no big freedoms or small ones; there is only freedom. Give away a piece and you’ve lost the whole thing. Allow a government to step too far from its role, and the cornerstone of American life will crumble. Giving government the right to chase down a keg or ticket a smoker is much easier than teaching our children the pitfalls of reckless behavior. But upon whom does the responsibility fall? It is an insult to the American family when a government is asked to teach our children morality. If we do our jobs at home, then we can expect our Mayor and Board to get back to theirs at City Hall.
Utopia, sadly, is a long way out. Let us return our expectations to normal, and ask of our leaders what should be their only role: to manage our town, not our personal lives.
Thanks for reading.
