This past Monday was national Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and it reminded me of something.

MLK Day, and seeing the movie “Selma” reminded me that the most challenging thing I have to accomplish each week is get the trash barrels out to the side of the road for Friday morning pickup.

I didn’t say hardest, or most difficult, or most physically or mentally unachievable. I said most challenging. Why?

Because I have to make sure one barrel has all trash ready to go in the house. The other barrel I have to make sure I have all recyclable materials ready to go – milk jugs, empty cereal boxes, etc. If I miss a week, next week might be so much stuff that it wouldn’t fit in the barrels. What then?!

Overflowing barrels in the garage. In the way of cars. Unhappy kids and spouse.

Neighbors saying (true story!): “Hey, I see you didn’t have your trash barrels out beside the road today. Everything OK?”

Suburban yuppie peril.

The ad in the newspaper for the movie “Selma” shows the back of Rev. Martin Luther’s King’s head – looking out onto a gigantic audience at a speech. That skull, and others in his movement, were subjected to police billy clubs in different locales and states in the Deep South for much of the l940s, ’50s, ’60s.

Blood, head wounds, broken bones, hospitalization, even death.

Despite this, there are actually people in this country – and in this state! – who will tell you the Civil Rights Movement was no big deal, just another political effort, much like topics you would see handled by Talking Heads on Fox News or MSNBC.

And certainly not anything that should merit its own day on a national scale.

This just baffles, and astounds, me.

I concede there are valid differences of opinions on various civil rights issues. I know some people wanted states to be able to handle their political and legal issues. I know some people feel that other movements and efforts either also merit a national day (women’s rights; certain ethnic groups; etc.).

But to say that the African Americans portrayed in the movie “Selma” did the things they did, and fought the political battles they fought, were in any way ordinary, or just another day at the beach is staggering.

Quick, tell me what is the most severe, or most substantial, thing you have ever gone through, or suffered, or experienced in pursuit of a goal?

Had to stand outside the high school principal’s office for 45 minutes once while waiting for a conference when you got a call that your kid had been suspended for an offense? Waited in pouring rain trying to return a product at a beach area store in the summer? Showed great patience while waiting for an hour at the polls to vote last presidential election, or trying to give blood at the Red Cross blood drive being sponsored by your daughter’s marching band?

Exactly.

Can you imagine wanting something so bad you would subject yourself to likely physical beatings? And then doing it again weeks or months later?

Martin Luther King Day is like the Fourth of July to me now. Solemn observance. Silent prayer. Flags out on the porch.

I am unwilling to approach MLK Day any other way now, just as rigid as observing the trash truck schedule. I just wish more of my 04074 land people agreed with me.

Dan Warren is a Scarborough lawyer who can be reached by private Facebook message at the Jones & Warren page, or by email at jonesandwarren@gmail.com.