Post-2008-election, I felt as though our country was finally regaining consciousness. I felt hope and optimism rise and my cynicism roll back ever-so-slightly, breezes of fresh thought dispersing the haze. As my vision returned, I could once again engage in conversations that did not fizzle into frustrated non-verbal noise. I began to see glimpses of a cultural evolution of thought through the wider population. Just glimpses, but they were there, I know it. I felt the whoosh of tired air as egos fat with imaginary power based on non-existent wealth were deflated by the reality of financial correction. I smiled as the facade of organized evangelical religion cracked under self-made storms of condescending hypocrisy. I grinned with sincere joy every time I heard new dialogue about race and culture in the wake of electing our first minority president. All in all, I saw daily reminders that people, all of us, are truly equal underneath all the cultural trappings. Eye contact became pleasant again. The obvious human connections we share - that we all love and laugh and hurt and seethe and wonder and sigh and ache and even hate - I could see those commonalities beginning to connect us again. We argue and bicker, we debate and discuss, we learn, we teach, we manage, we create, we err and we try. We help, we care, sometimes we dismiss. We each react to information and situations from our own perspectives, wrought upon our own personalities by our own life stories. But we seemed to be listening to each other again. I hoped anew that as a culture, we were learning that all of those life stories matter. That each one of us brings a unique self to the cultural table and that even when we strenuously disagree, we do not dismiss each other simply because of it. Silly me. Last week, a friend of mine was fired. Not a big deal, you might think, as people have been laid off in record numbers (including myself) over the past months of economic strife. Sure, a big deal for him, maybe. But, well, welcome to the masses. Except that this friend represented something we cannot afford to lose, and his firing rips further into the frayed fiber of our local democracy. Sadly, too many will dismiss the loss as no big deal - for the exact reason we so desperately needed Sylvester Brown to stay.