It hurts

“Write hard and clear about what hurts”
~Ernest Hemingway

It has been quite some time since my last Substack post. For much of the time I have been rehabilitating from the accident, as well as having new issues crop up that stem from the accident.

There is rarely a day that passes when I am not reminded of the quote by Earnest Hemingway that I wrote at the beginning of this posting. Nor is there rarely a day that passes when I am not reminded—throughout the day, of how many things “hurt.”

And it is this that has kept me from writing.

When I began this site it was with the mission of presenting things to make you think—and to feel, but also with the underlying devotion to inspire hope in every heart that read my writings.

For me that has become increasingly difficult—in part because while I still recover, and am still unable to drive, searching the world for stories is difficult, but also because without traveling I am not exposed to the diversity of stories that abound. Also, I have been committed to finishing my book America Found, which is nearly complete!

Ever since I was released from the hospital—at the beginning of May 2025, I have wanted to write about the accident; not as a means of gaining sympathies of any kind, but rather to talk about my journey from death to life. I have also wanted to write a piece about something that I became profoundly aware of: the power of prayer—not from a palace of any specific religion, or faith, but prayer in and of itself.

Lately too I have been pondering war. More to the point I have been pondering why we still have wars. I’m sure that some of you will have the simple answer of the need to defend ourselves, and there is validity to such an answer. But I want to explore this question at its deepest levels—whatever those levels happen to be, and for that I would love your input.

In my spiritual faith there is a writing that I will paraphrase here, but the analogy will still be the same. The writing equates the countries of the world to the human body in that, if one cuts their hand, the white blood cells in the leg do not say “oh well, that’s the hand which has nothing to do with the leg.” No, the white blood cells in the leg say hey, a part of the body is cut and we need to rush to the site—to combine us with the white blood cells from the rest of the body to protect it from an invading infection.

If every country in the world chose this same commitment to one another, wars would end. If a country attempted to invade another country, and all of the remaining countries came to the aide of the country being invaded, the invaders would cease immediately.

That is what the United Nations, and even NATO were established to do—but over the decades corruption set in and the primary countries: the U.S., Russia, and China, predominantly, approved for themselves a veto power, and then the corruption deepened from there.

Now we have Russia invading Ukraine, Israel invaded Palestine, the U.S is talking about invading Venezuela, China is talking of invading Taiwan, and North Korea has even rattled its swords toward South Korea.

An acquaintance of mine—a retired ER doctor of 35 years, talked about the men recruited as soldiers are primarily at the prime age when testosterone peaks in men—17 -22 years old. Immediately I had a solution: the age for military service should be 71 years old, and up. Then, when they would go off to war they would disembark from the transports, the lower backs hurting, their bodies would be tired, the would be moving slow (on both sides) and shortly they would have the suggestion of everyone just sitting down and having a beer, and talking about whatever was on their mind.

Soon peace would prevail.

In the coming weeks I will return to my writing here on Substack. I will do my best to adhere to keeping things hope-inspiring, but if I engage from time to time in a bit of a rant, forgive me.

~David