Where is the Love?

I talked to my friend the other day, one of the most incredible people I know, someone who lives every day in poverty and with a debilitating illness. She and her boyfriend recently packed up their kids and moved from Chicago to Oklahoma, having heard that the economy was booming there and they'd be able to find jobs. They arrived, put their kids into the local public schools, and had to face two really tough realities:

1) My friend's medical card, which allowed her to see the doctor and get the prescriptions she needs to manage her illness, does not work in Oklahoma, and she doesn't have the money to pay for them out-of-pocket; and

2) Although there are help-wanted signs everywhere in Norman, and she and her boyfriend have filled out countless applications, they've yet to be called back after they turn in their applications. Unlike in Chicago, African-Americans make up a very small minority there, and it isn't a minority with which a lot of the other people are comfortable.

This number from the Black-Eyed Peas is a brilliant commentary on the only prescription that has a shot at curing these sorts of entrenched problems:

But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And when you hate then you're bound to get irate, yeah
Madness is what you demonstrate
And that's exactly how anger works and operates
Man, you gotta have love just to set it straight
Take control of your mind and meditate

Let your soul gravitate to the love, y'all, y'all

I'm off to meditate, let my soul gravitate to the love, and hope that will help it extend to those who haven't had the good fortune that I've had to know intimately someone whom others might judge unfavorably on the basis of her skin color or the way she talks.