It’s amazing what can happen in the course of one little year. The fortunes of a nation can be completely altered in such a short span of time. I remember driving around Tooele a year ago and seeing “Help Wanted” signs on a number of small businesses in town. I remember celebrations as businesses were opening new facilities and hiring workers, seeing billboards encouraging locals to apply for positions to avoid the commute to Salt Lake.

Now we see different signs: “Closed” or “Going Out of Business.” We see hundreds of people in our community looking for work, any work, just to get by. In last Tuesday’s Transcript-Bulletin, Tim Gillie reported on the dramatic upswing in people looking for help finding jobs in this depressed economy (“County employment centers struggling to place throng of job seekers”). Add to that the housing crisis, with people struggling to make mortgage payments and losing their homes, and we see exactly what a difference a year can make.

Looking at the situation and how much change has happened in the course of one year makes a person stop and think — think about life, family and the things that really matter. How much have we taken for granted over the past several years, assuming that it would always be there? How many of us bought things that we really couldn’t afford or had no plan to pay for in the event of a change of fortunes? How many of us are now in serious financial trouble? I’m not trying to preach here. I’m as guilty as the next person. We all got caught up in a consumption economy, spending tomorrow’s money before it had been earned.

And it has caught up to us. All of us. Banks are struggling and reaching for federal bailouts, people are losing their homes, their cars, everything. Businesses that depend upon the flow of credit are struggling to make regular payroll, resulting in job losses all across the nation. More job losses mean less people buying, which means more businesses struggle. The cycle goes on and on.

We can point the finger of blame any number of places: those greedy Wall Street guys, the bankers that talked us into adjustable-rate or balloon-payment mortgages, the Bush Administration, Congress, the Federal Reserve. Those guys. There’s plenty of blame to go around, but what’s really lacking is responsibility.

We all made mistakes that helped to create this economic problem, and we all need to fix it. It’s not something that is going to happen tomorrow, next week or next month. This crisis is going to be with us for quite some time — political promises aside. Hard times, though, are when America shines. They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and when times are tough and inspiration is needed, America always comes through.

What makes that happen isn’t the greatness of any one person or any group of people, it’s the greatness inherent in us all. It is the unbeatable, unbreakable American spirit. It is our communities coming together to hold out the helping hand to our neighbors in need. It is recognizing our differences as strengths and using them to better all of society, instead of making them reasons to hate or fear. That is the challenge for each of us: to unite in the face of adversity and show the world that American spirit once again.

Bob Henline is a Tooele resident and political activist. He can be reached at bob@nonpart.org.