Who Took My Fearless?

I experienced 'changing with the times' in a terribly disappointing way today. As I was exiting a grocery, my purse over my shoulder, a bag in each hand, one hand also holding my keys, a man shouted at me from a picnic table nearby. Said he was hungry and asked if I would buy him a sandwich.

In the past, I would have handed him cash. This time, I knew I had twenties and coins and nothing between and, sadly can't afford to hand out twenties anymore. <--- Ahhhh it's all backwards, since everything costs more for them, too. So, I said I didn't have cash but hold on.

I unlocked my car, purse still on my shoulder, sat the bags on my seat, and pulled out a package of crackers and tub of artichoke/cheese dip. Yummy, and planned it for my lunch, but I could eat something else, and I offered it to him.

"No," he said. "I want a turkey sandwich."

And the memories flooded. I met a man one time when I really had left the office without cash, who wouldn't share my vegetable fried rice. He never did like rice. And my heart broke because that man looked hungry, and tired, and broken, and kind. And I wanted desperately to have him sit down and share my meal, and my friendship. And he would not.

I followed him for years, bringing him gloves, scarves, cash, and smiles. No rice. I wrote a poem about him and grieved when he disappeared, and I didn't know if it was due to finding a better place- or worse.

I told the guy I met today that I was sorry I had no cash for turkey. And I was sorry at that point.

He rose from his sitting position, appeared ready to step my way, and said, "Go back inside and use your card." No please, not like a question.

And I got in my car, locked the door, and drove away. Uncomfortable on every level. 😥

I miss being fearless.

On the drive home, I unpacked the many factors that were in play:

• COVID (this was a place where everyone still wears a mask to enter the store and I didn't see a mask on him and wonder if a homeless person has access anymore)
• times are depressingly tough for everyone, making it even harder for people who have to depend on generosity of others
• the heat (roads were literally melting in some places, power was out in several states, fires and flooding (both related to climate change), high winds in areas . . . had made many people irritable
• racists and domestic terrorists are emboldened by fascists formerly known as the Republican Party, probably making this man’s life harder and extremely disappointing at his age
• guns
  

Overthinking all of this is so much a part of me that all my related info and sadness kicks in spontaneously. Probably nothing mattered more than my *regret* that the reality of GUNS - combined with my age and disabilities - altered how I can honor who I really am.

To answer the question in my title, fascist-republicans made it dangerous for me to live my fearless and I blame Mitch McConnell first, along with the rest of the people he led, abetted, and carried into to a cult of mentally and emotionally unbalanced, anti-America, wannabe fascists.

 

The Real Profile in Courage

I am grateful for Liz Cheney's participation in the Jan 6 committee work. Extremely grateful for this one good act that will most likely end her political career. 

 

But, (and yes, I know that but takes away from the statement, maybe negates it) this alone will not make up for all the harm she has done or make her a hero or profile in courage by my carefully developed criteria. Heroic would have been speaking out BEFORE the party she voted in lockstep with put this country on life support. Heroic would have been standing before cameras and working hard to keep an unqualified, mentally unstable, criminally suspicious, known hypocrite, probably RINO and CINO man from being (s)elected the first time. Heroic would have been demanding a full investigation of Russian interference and electoral tampering before the inauguration.

Heroic would have been calling out her own father when he demonstrated that he was evil and corrupt, and when he made a fortune by invading Iraq instead of Saudi Arabia, home of the actual attackers. 

Profiles in courage don't abet the bad guys before they stand up against them.

 

If she leaves the fascist-republican party, and the NRA, and stays in office and VOTES to clean up the messes she helped make, I will update my overall opinion to give her the respect she will have earned.

 

Her history of voting in lockstep with fascist-republicans, and her negligence in not calling out her father, is unacceptable. She never did the right thing before and is suddenly receiving praise for finally doing ONE thing right and that's far too little too late for the praise and titles I see people who should know better offering her.  

 

HER ACTIONS/VOTES caused tremendous stress and work for good people who always do the right things - the HARD things, the things that risked their carriers and got them years of dishonest, hideous attacks from media and internet morons, the things for which they received many threats for many years.

 

NANCY PELOSI is THE Profile in Courage. Other Democrats who have worked long and hard with her also earned that title. 

Words Matter. 

Legacies Matter.

 

The Insanity of the US Gun Violence Discussion

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

Thoughts and prayers, commonsense gun laws, bipartisanship – same things, same words, all cliché to the point that they mean NOTHING. We have plenty of evidence telling us that none of this is going to make the differences we need.

"Thoughts and prayers" is gaslighting from the right and complicity from the left and neither thoughts nor prayers fix anything. Logic and honesty matter. The median in the country's commonsense appears to be somewhere around a double-digit IQ with no critical thinking skills and irrational fear of 'others' so it should not be our goal. And Mitch McConnell and his cult of domestic terrorists have made it clear that their goal is to NEVER reach bipartisanship on anything that the majority in this country support.

We are NOT having the national discussion we need to be having and we look like fools to the world.

When we talk about mental health being the problem while demonstrating that we are collectively insanely denying the obvious:

·         we are coddling the people who want to do us the most harm

·         we are entertaining liars who protect killers and the people who profit from death

we lose all credibility.

Let’s have a sane, reflective, ration, meaningful conversation on gun violence, the NRA (and how they keep tax-exempt status and any voice in this conversation) based on decades of evidence and experience on declaration of what we must and will do, whether both sides agree or do not. And then fight to protect the citizens of the United States of America from domestic terrorists, angry neighbors, abusive partners, attention seekers, and people who want to commit suicide-by-cop.