David McElroy

Most people have no idea what they stand for, but they know very clearly who and what they hate. That makes me very uneasy, because I feel it from people of every political position — and this isn’t the way things ought to be.

When George W. Bush was president, most Democrats hated him far more than they liked any Democrat who might take his place. Since Barack Obama has been president, most Republicans hate him with a passion, but only a tiny percentage of them actually like Mitt Romney, who won the GOP contest to be their standard-bearer. Why is this?

I think part of it is a modern form of tribalism. We like to think of ourselves as past such crude ways of acting, but that’s wishful thinking. If you arbitrarily divide people into a Purple Party and a Yellow Party, both groups will soon develop all sorts of “reasons” why their sides is wonderful and the other is evil and wrong. (And they’ll each declare that their reasons are rational.)

Beyond that, though, I suspect there’s another very important reason. It’s simply easier to feel and express hate than it is to articulate something good and find the character to stand for that instead of the hate.

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I would have sworn that Jack and Martha were newlyweds if they hadn’t been quite a bit on the older side. When they first came into the fast food restaurant where I was having dinner Monday night, they seemed like a young couple in love. I couldn’t help but smile when I saw them sit at a booth together — side by side instead of across from one another. What I didn’t know then is that they were newlyweds. They just got married Monday.

Jack fell in love with Martha more than 50 years ago, but he was too timid to approach the girl he said was the prettiest in the school. Besides, Martha always had plenty of dates, so he didn’t think she could possibly be interested in a skinny boy with little confidence and no apparent future. That was in the early ’60s at a high school near Birmingham. Neither knew that they would end up together in 2012.

Jack graduated from high school two years ahead of Martha and headed off to college. He kept a picture of Martha that he had gotten from one of her friends. Unknown to him at the time, Martha had wanted Jack to ask her out, but he had never shown any interest.

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Some of the most meaningful presents don’t come from a store. For one young woman who graduated from high school last week, her graduation gift from her father cost only a few dollars at a store 13 years ago — but what he’s done with it over the years will make it priceless to her.

I don’t know the woman’s name, but she told her story by posting pictures of herself and the gift from her father on Thursday. Since then, it’s been seen by more than 4 million people.

The story starts when she started kindergarten. Her father bought a copy of the Dr. Seuss book, “Oh, the Places You’ll Go,” and he’s kept it a secret all these years. Without her knowing about it, the father has been getting every teacher, principal and coach who knew her along the way to write about her at the time they were dealing with her. I’ll let her tell her own story:

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