GRATITUDE IN A TIME OF PAIN AND BETRAYAL

By Ruth A. Sheets

November 24, 2024

Nearly 3 weeks ago, an election was held which will impact our lives for at least the next 4 years and if predictions are accurate, far longer than that.  The American people had a choice that day of voting for Harris who wanted to see more joy in the world; more rights for people, particularly for women over their own bodies; more opportunities for working-class and financially disadvantaged Americans; more opportunities for people living in this country for many years, to become citizens, more work toward stopping global warming; more appreciation of the diversity of this nation in our attempts to make this a “more perfect union, and the other choice, less of all of the above.  The American people, if voting counts are correct, chose the latter and here we are, anticipating what that is going to be like.  I admit I feel betrayed. 

 

So, for the past almost 3 weeks, I have been working to move past the intense grief that my fellow Americans chose hopelessness, pain, anger, fear, distrust, incompetence, and above all, hatred as leadership for our nation. I keep hearing people trying to understand or pontificate over the reasons, but I am not sure there is a reason beyond the often unexamined, unadmitted All-American racism, misogyny, xenophobia, homo/transphobia, classism, and more that stalk our nation.  Evidence of this can be seen all over the country, particularly in the “red” states where governors and legislators are competing to see which state can do the most damage to its non-white, non-male, non-rich, non-christian, non-straight citizens.  The strange thing to me is that somehow, the victims just keep re-electing those who do the most harm.

 

Knowing all this and also understanding that I will not give up despite the darkness ahead, I decided I must hold onto the hope, joy, love, and care that Mr. Trump and his gang are trying so hard to destroy as they undermine programs that actually help people who are not rich as they are, and perhaps, our democracy itself. 

 

I have been considering what I am grateful for and I thought it might help me see the beauty in the upcoming holidays and change of season.  So, here goes.  I am grateful that . . .

 

• - I have an amazing family that is nearly as diverse as this nation and its members are talented in so many ways from my youngest grandnephew living just down the road to my older sisters, living too far away, alas;
• - I have music as a centerpiece in my life, a family that had us all singing before we could talk
• - I sing with a musical group that brings pleasure to audiences because the music of early America is fun, sometimes reverent, and helped shape our nation’s founding;
• - I received a guitar for Christmas when I was in high school and although I am not too good at playing it, I still can accompany people to sing a whole lot of really great songs;
• - I have the privilege of continuing to teach as a tutor for kids who have so much potential, but don’t yet believe it, with colleagues who are enormously skilled and caring;
• - I have a great place to live, nearly 29 years, when I never thought I would have something so nice;
• - I can cook and bake muffins my nephew Parker loves, and well, I do too;
• - I love reading and have access to recorded books of all kinds, at least one in 6 that are really good, so in addition, I am grateful for such outstanding writers and poets;
• - yesterday, my brother-in-law was able to fix my computer, phew!;
•  

There is more I am grateful for, bit thinking about just those I have named here has brought me some peace, so I will leave it there for now.  One thing I have learned, though, gratitude can’t be a competition to see whose slices of life gratitude are more valid or significant than someone else’s.  This exercise is just a way of looking to the positive.

 

So, I hope you, too, will find an opportunity to run through the things that make you feel gratitude.  I suspect we all will need those thoughts to help us through the next months and years among people who will come to realize that maybe their choice wasn’t a very good one, and others who are working hard to cause that realization.

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

FINAL ELECTION THOUGHTS

By Ruth A. Sheets

November 4, 2024

What many of us have noticed over the past decade or so is that Donald Trump's voice has a cadence that can almost mesmerize people into thinking first, that he is strong, then that he is going to do something for them, then that he will gladly identify for them the people they should despise, if not actually hate.  That seems to be comforting for a lot of people who have bought the myth of "the American dream."  They believe that they have a platter that must be filled with all the goodies they are sure they deserve:  a job that pays a lot with little thinking involved, a family with no real challenges, and a house in the suburbs surrounded only by people who look and think as they do.  That "dream" has not been a reality for more than a few people for a long time, but reality is not what Trump's message is about. 

I keep hearing that Harris does not reach the "working" people as Trump does, while she is the one who is closest to and who has done far more for the working people than Trump has or ever will.  It is ironic that a man who has never worked a day in his life would claim to be for the workingpeople.  He proved with a McDonald’s stunt and one that had something to do with a garbage truck that he has no clue.  He couldn’t have made change for those pretend customers at Micky D’s and couldn’t really manage the fryer either, but there are actually people out here who believe he worked there longer than Kamala Harris did, a woman who worked a summer at a real, open McDonalds.  I don’t know what that garbage truck thing was except to maybe claim that America is garbage.  I am wondering why he would want to rule garbage, but maybe, that says more about Trump than this nation.

 

It seems to me the thing Trump really taps into is white fear and loathing.  White people for centuries have been told and promised that we are the best, the brightest, the most valuable, the most righteous beings on Earth and that everyone else is less, much less, even animals.  What amazes me is that any white Americans have been able to move beyond that place of privilege.  Many have, but many have not.  We see that privilege among Trump supporters who don't even need an honest reason for supporting a man who literally cares nothing for them and has told them so, a man who is an insurrectionist, a breaker of his oath, a constant liar, a convicted criminal, an adjudicated rapist, and the rest.  They just know he is white, can point out to them the people they should blame for their problems, who lets them ignore history, even recent history that has RICH white people sending their former jobs overseas to countries where people of color can do the work far cheaper, who will tolerate appalling conditions American workers, even those without unions, would not tolerate. 

Our media platforms have decided that Trump is a useful tool to give their rich benefactors whatever they want, so they "sanewash" Trump and diminish whatever Harris does and has done.  It's a neat little package for whitedom. 

 Where does this put us?  Tomorrow is Election Day.  The utter ignorance and bad faith of many of our media platforms could help put Trump, an empty suit with a bunch of unscrupulous sycophants back in the White House, this time with no one on board who will stand in defense of our nation, our people, and our democracy, and against Trump’s destruction and ignorance. 

 So, as always, it's about power and money and who we want to hold those potentially destructive forces, and what we will permit them to do with them.  It's also about who Whitedom will blame and what they will do if they don't get what they believe they want and deserve. Trump and friends are much like toddlers in a bad parenting situation, toddlers who will terrorize the family if no one stops them.  These toddlers have the sensibilities of 3-year-olds but with all sorts of weapons and folks letting them do whatever damage they can.  Who in the world wants to have toddlers in charge of our government?  I don’t understand how anyone would.