long time comin'

Today begins the Democratic National Convention. Nah. I don't want to talk about that. What has happened in our lives since the last post in January 2020 is Covid. But I don't want to talk about that either. Home life. We let Sid go to heaven. He wasn't having fun anymore. Its hard to tell with a very old dog who thinks he's still a puppy, but the time was right, and he leaves Duffy and Mac in his considerable wake. They missed him at first -- at least Duffy did. Mac doesn't think all that much, it seems. And fuck pitbulls except Sid. We walk to a small park near our house each evening, let the dogs poop, wear Mac out, and this one evening I went by myself. Most of Yamhill lets their dogs be off-leash in the park, as do we, but I'd leashed up my dogs and was exiting the park when a large pitt appeared. "That fucker came out of nowhere," to quote some movie. His owner, a woman, said something like "she's okay" so I kept walking and the dog looked at Duffy, cocked its head and charged. No time passed. I screamed, "NO!" and I like to believe that is why she stopped attacking for a moment as I yanked Duffy from the solidly clamped jaws of death. With Duffy's fluffiness, I didn't see any wounds until we got home. Truth be told, I was pretty traumatized--not thinking, just acting. Turns out he was pretty tore up. Six wounds, two requiring stitches. $120.00 later I'd like to find that chick. Sid was never like that. The only fight he ever got in was with an urban raccoon and he lost that one decisively. My garden is huge, and with Kurt working from home since March, it gets enough water to produce gallons of pickles, jam, tomato sauce, pesto and zuchinni. Okay. Now I'm ready to talk about the intersection of health, religion and politics. I live in Yamhill, Oregon, which is nowhere. My neighbors, almost without exception, are republicans, but good country folk. They really are, but they think Covid is a hoax and are proud of not wearing masks and they think trump is doing his best against great and unfair odds. My own son is a racist and right wing-nut. This disturbs me in ways that make me regret decisions I made to pay attention to my own spiritual/political/educational development to the evident exclusion of his. I got sober. I wasn't paying too much attention as I clawed my way out of the soul-claiming abyss of alcoholism and drug addiction. I want, badly, to say "sue me," right here, but that would be insincere and you know me. Always sincere. Ha. But I fear my internal focus left my son on the outside of things, philosophically speaking, although, he, too, finally stopped drinking. I remember when I was two or three years sober, some 30-odd years ago. I came home from a meeting and there was my then-eleven year old son, watching a baseball game. Life is good, I thought. How completely well-adjusted we are, I thought. He says to me, "Mom, I know who I want for my higher power." I answered, "Really? Who." Evidently he'd been listening during meetings where this was emphasized. He said, "Jose Canseco." The pitcher for some the Oakland A's or some shit. Yeah. So. Wow. I'm off the rails. So now my son is nearly a QAnon follower, although I think even he draws the line at lizard people. I blame Donald Trump, but I shouldn't. We democrats lost the last election because of individual, wish list (pretty little foot stamping demands) politics. You can't talk me out of this so don't try. I am a fairly conservative, which is to say old, democrat. I believe neo-liberalism has pretty much destroyed America, but am not in any hurry to succumb to the necessary reparations to get us where we need to be. And where is that? I thought you'd never ask. The notion that the market magically knows what is right and good and true, that given untrammelled opportunity and the demolition of government siderails, seatbelts and all that is holy, specially selected white men will make good decisions that benefit the many, has proven patently false. Trump and his bastard clan have driven the wheels off this idea and if you can appreciate any single thing about this boil on the ass of humanity, its that he's out in the open with it. All balls, no brains. But somebody's got brains. Believe that. Watchout. They have reanimated Frankenstein, dismantled America, and put nobody in charge because that, folks, is what Freedom looks like. Period. With our televised consent. So. Its all felt pretty far away in DC. I live in the country, Covid feels distant--though I take it seriously enough, I hope, to remain well, but now he's going too far. I'm a lifelong letter-writer and he's going after the Post Office. My Post Office. He's trying to privatize that sacred strong-hold of reliable communication, the US Mail. I'm sure there are worse things like Black Lives Matter, but this is on my ground. I'm a writer. Leave letters alone. I'm not getting into the BLM thing except to say the little shitheads in Portland who brought enough attention to our little blue state that trump sent the stormtroopers to town should be in jail. Not the black folks. Not the protesters. The anarchists. Blacks can and should do their thing. I don't pretend to know what the solution is to that longstanding problem. They will, however, have to pay the consequences for their actions. That's how it works and I think they know that. Its pretty messy right now, perhaps necessarily so, but people will die needless deaths. Again. Still, not my fight except as an ally, and that term morphs daily. Its hard to get it right. I'm a distant supporter out here in the sticks. The white kids who just want to blow shit up, who think they are promoting a progressive agenda, are not helping. I used to have sign over my desk. It said, "If things don't get better around here I'm going to have to ask you to stop helping me." I need it now. I know Biden/Harris is an imperfect ticket. I am OVER so-called Progressives (butt-hurt Bernie fans) stamping their little feet, again, because they didn't get their way, again. I think it will be a solid decade before a truly progressive agenda replaces neo-liberalism. and frankly, I don't know that progressives have the patience to wait for it. They can't seem to decide what's most important, who gets to go first, who's turn it is, why they have to wait a fucking minute for us old folks to die off so they can take the wheel now that there are no remaining tires on the vehicle. By that time, they'll be old, too, invested in a system that used to work, and just trying to protect thier social security like I am. Jaysus. Oh, yes. And Jesus. Really. Poor Jesus. I've always said that Christian's are a poor representation of Christ. They rally behind Dear Leader, the emperor with no clothes, as though the Holy Bible said, "Deify the chosen one, right or wrong, follow him off a cliff," rather than "Obey the law of the land." And off the cliff they go. Help them, baby Jesus. They know exactly what they do. Predictions: The election will happen on time. Joe Biden will win handily. dear leader will pitch a fit but will leave eventually and he will be tried and convicted of treason. His little alt right army of proud boys will start a brief civil war in which a few will die, and democrats will try, but fail, to make everything perfect, and color-coordinated, with one of each (red and yellow black and white they are precious in his sight) and three or four edgy LGBYQRSTUVWXYZ with blue hair and politically-oh-so-correct language that will be passe the moment it is uttered. ad nauseum. Gawd.