From the desk

On Sunday, Lynchburg was given a gift of perspective — snow.

There is something beautiful about the perfection of snow. Maybe it is its uncanny ability to cover everything in its path and give everything a new appearance — a new perspective.

This spring semester has brought with it a lot of baggage. The political scene is heating up, the job market continues to flounder, construction continues to change the face of Liberty University — not to mention Lynchburg, GLTC managed to, yet again, recover a fraction of its losses, and Whitney Houston is no more.

All of these things, and many more, have a tendency to shift our Americanized philosophical perspective on life, love and, of course, the pursuit of happiness.

Take the presidential primary elections, for instance.

We have a propensity to fight so long and hard over the perfect candidate to lead our nation that we lose sight of the bigger picture. We spend so much time hating the people who stand on our side of the fence. We forget we are all running after the same purpose.

Yes, choosing the correct presidential candidate to run against our current president is important. The Republican Party needs someone strong, courageous, smart and economically minded. However, instead of searching for all of those things the Republican Party is spending its time fighting over all of the wrong things.

We pull out each candidate’s dirty laundry and argue over whether grass stains trump mud stains, whether ripped knees are worse than frayed heals.

Yet, somehow I am convinced we are missing the point. It is not the perfect candidate we should be looking for, but the worthy one.

Perfection is something that cannot be found in this lifetime.

As the snow falls and covers the land, our perspective may change — but the reality doesn’t. Snow allows us to see the beauty that could be despite the imperfection.

In kindergarten, I did a project with snow. My class went outside and we each filled a cup with the white wonder. Then we set our cups inside our classroom before leaving for the rest of the day.

The next morning when the class came into the classroom, we were all surprised at what our perfect white snow had become. It was nothing more than dirty, foggy water. Our teacher then explained to us the appearance of white.

She said that if the snow were actually completely clean and without other foreign bodies, it would not appear as white to the naked eye — but would appear to be less dense and more ice-like.

The beauty of snow is not actually in its perfection — but in its imperfection.

Is it possible that our perfect candidate is also worthy in his, or her, imperfection as well? Who is to say that having a past should disqualify a person from leading a successful future?

Whether the 2012 Republican presidential candidate is Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich or Ron Paul, I am convinced that the airing of their dirty laundry, or the dissection of their past mistakes, is not going to make them a better qualified or acceptable candidate.