About 18 years ago I found myself at
the annual hunting camp of my friend Bruce, who was at the time the Under-Sheriff
for Park County, Wyoming. Both Bruce and
I are originally from Minnesota so, when I moved to Wyoming he took it upon
himself to orient me to Wyoming culture, at the center of which was elk
hunting. I had never hunted for anything
bigger than a pheasant before so my “orientation” proved to be a steep learning
curve. Nevertheless, having successfully
shot a cow elk in my first season, Bruce felt I was ready to join him and his
buddies at his hunting camp for my second hunting season. By “buddies,” I soon found out, Bruce meant a
gathering of about 10 law enforcement officers, most of whom were also from
Minnesota. Among them was Jim.
Jim was maybe 10 years older than I was, a retired officer of the Minneapolis Police Force, and a great storyteller. We hit it off almost immediately and were soon sharing our stories of life in Minnesota: fishing, farming, hunting and, of course, the weather. But, when Jim began to tell his stories about providing police coverage for anti-war protests on the University of Minnesota Campus, it was more than his great storytelling that made me feel as if I had been there too……… because I had been.
Jim was maybe 10 years older than I was, a retired officer of the Minneapolis Police Force, and a great storyteller. We hit it off almost immediately and were soon sharing our stories of life in Minnesota: fishing, farming, hunting and, of course, the weather. But, when Jim began to tell his stories about providing police coverage for anti-war protests on the University of Minnesota Campus, it was more than his great storytelling that made me feel as if I had been there too……… because I had been.
Jim sat there quietly as I shared with him that
I had been one of those protesters and that it was highly likely that he and I
had been on the UofM campus on the same day, on opposite side of the protest
lines. When I finished, Jim remained
silent and I wondered if this would be the quick end to budding friendship. But then he said “those were different times”
and then he and I went on to share more stories and a great hunting weekend….. and
I felt included.
Inclusion. A
foundational part of our LBCC Mission, one of our five Values and one of the
seven Strategic Initiatives in our Strategic Plan. Obviously, Inclusion is important to us at
LBCC…. but it’s also hard. Inclusion is
easy when we all see things the same way, say things the same way, walk down
the same road the same way…. but we don’t.
Instead, we bring – we embody – differences in history, culture,
beliefs, economics, race, gender, sexual orientation, and hundreds of other
differences that tend to separate us into camps, place us on opposite sides of
issues, and on the opposite sides of protest lines….. like Jim and me.
Nonetheless, Jim and I saw each
other across those lines and included each other in each other’s lives. Perhaps it was the vantage point that comes
from being a decade or two away from and older than we were at our first
“meeting,” but what we realized in our second meeting at that hunting camp was
that there were good patriotic Americans – and good people - on both sides of
those protest lines.
“We hold these truths to be
self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and
the pursuit of Happiness.”
I, along with many scholars,
suspect that the writers of the Declaration of Independence did not fully
appreciate all that would come to be understood in these words, but few would
suggest that they would be anything other than pleased with the expanding and
absolute understanding of Inclusion that the word “all” has come to mean for us
as Americans… and for us here at LBCC.
“To engage in an education that enables all of us . . .”
Whether we wave a peace sign or an
American flag, whether we stand or kneel or lock arms in solidarity, whether we
know God’s name as Jesus, Yahweh, Allah or some other name, whether we are
Native American, European American, Latino American, Black American or some
other American, whether we are gay or straight or something else, and whether
we are liberal or conservative or something else, there is nothing in these
differences that make us anything other than good people who have a right to
and a place in our country, our community, and here at LBCC. This is what Inclusion means…. “all of us.”
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