JOY IN THE MOMENT

By Ruth A. Sheets

Life is tough right now for so many and with little improvement on the horizon.  In this moment, it is critical that we all find moments, hours, events of joy where it occurs and not ignore it when it shows up for us.  I just finished the book "Joyful Anyway" by Kate Bowler.  She is a cancer survivor who has had numerous difficulties in her life and had to teach herself to take in joy where it is, often unexpected, unprepared for, and startling. 

I have been trying to do that and it truly helps since I plan to stay connected with what this ignorant, heartless, blustering, hateful, disgusting Trumplandia is doing to us, our communities, our nation, and the world and respond to it wherever I can.  I admit that sometimes I find joy in responding to their toddleresque behavior with comments about them being rich white toddler-men with a few toddler-women on the side.  They have nothing positive to offer anyone and seem to get their "joy" from hurting others, particularly vulnerable people, people of color and women.  That’s just what one should expect of whiny bratty rich white toddler-adults who somehow never had to grow up. 

The reality is that if people who don't pay attention hadn't given them far more power than they deserve, they would be nothing, just small men pushing people around locally and seen for what they are, nobodies who deserve no power. 

When I need a lift, I imagine Miller, Vought, Mullins, Musk, Vance, and the flavor of the moment in one of the concentration camp prisons they have cobbled together to destroy immigrants of color and our communities.  (I don’t imagine Trump there only because of his serious illnesses and dementia.)  Republicans' backbones have been melted down to create Trumplandia.  The Pathetic Republican members of Congress have no place there because they are just fodder for those whose goal in life is to use people and to gain as much of everything as they can, and at everyone else's expense, even Congressional and state legislature Republicans and the MAGAs.  They prove this every single day.

Working together to build better after we have removed these appalling examples of humanity from our government is a strong source of joy, hope, and well-being, as are the commentors I follow like Prof. Robert Reich on Substack.  A couple of years ago, I attended online each week Prof. Reich's "last class" at Berkley on the economy, and learned a lot to add to what I had already learned from an amazing economics professor back in undergrad days.  It gives me joy to remember Prof. Shirley Newton, an extraordinary woman who believed and taught that the government and our economy should work for the people not just for the lucky and the rich. 

In these difficult times, for the sake of our mental and physical health, let's all go find joy; it's out there just waiting for us!  Oh wait, we can help to create it for others too!

It is critical that we all find moments, hours, events of joy where it occurs and not ignore it when it shows up for us.  I just finished the book "Joyful Anyway" by Kate Bowler.  She is a cancer survivor who has had numerous difficulties in her life and had to teach herself to take in joy where it is, often unexpected, unprepared for, and startling. 

I have been trying to do that and it truly helps because I plan to stay connected with what this ignorant, heartless, blustering, hateful, disgusting Trumplandia is doing to us, our communities, our nation, and the world.  I admit that sometimes I find joy in responding to their toddleresque behavior with comments about them being rich white toddler-men with a few toddler-women on the side.  They have nothing positive to offer anyone and seem to get their "joy" from hurting others, particularly vulnerable people, people of color and women.  The reality is that if people who don't pay attention hadn't given them far more power than they deserve, they would be nothing, just small men pushing people around locally and seen for what they are, nobodies who deserve no power. 

When I need a lift, I imagine Miller, Vought, Mullins, Musk, Vance, and the flavor of the moment in one of the concentration camp prisons they have cobbled together because Republicans' backbones have been melted down to create Trumplandia.  That is where those pathetic Republican members of Congress have no place because they are just fodder for those whose goal in life is to use people and to gain as much of everything as they can, and at everyone else's expense, even the MAGAs.  They prove this every single day.

Working together to build better after we have removed these appalling examples of humanity from our government is a potential source of joy and well-being, as are the commentors I follow like Prof. Reich.  I attended online each week of Prof. Reich's "last class" at Berkley and learned a lot to add to what I had already learned from an amazing economics professor back in undergrad days.  It gives me joy to remember Prof. Shirley Newton, an extraordinary woman who believed and taught that the government and our economy should work for the people not just for the lucky and the rich. 

Let's all go find joy; it's out there waiting for us!  Oh wait, we can help to create it for others too!

WHITE HISTORY - WHY

By Ruth A. Sheets

Way back in the 1950s, I faced a challenge.  I started kindergarten and thought I was just like other kids until some of my classmates started calling me “Four Eyes.”  I had no idea what that meant until one of my friends told me “you know, your glasses.”  I still didn’t get it.  My parents explained that this was an insult.  I didn’t get it  because my glasses let me see stuff better.  Over time, though I got it.

I was carefully put in my place as inferior.  I was supposed to stay out of everyone else’s way because I couldn’t see as well as they could, so shouldn’t try for anything more than what I was given, sometimes sitting in front of the class to see the board.

History is filled with people being told covertly or brazenly that those doing the speaking were superior and that the receiver of the comments, insults, dismissal was inferior and worthy of what the superior chose to say or do to them.  The inferior is never supposed to object, try to escape the judgment, or go beyond what is expected/permitted as Black people, indigenous persons, immigrants, the LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY, WOMEN, and others HAVE DONE AT VARIOUS TIMES THROUGHOUT HISTORY.  All of our groups have been targeted at one point or other by those “conservative” white men, some white women and a very few token others.

There are a lot of markers in society to divide people:  race, gender, ethnicity, language, religion, education level, wealth, job, parentage, place of origin, height, weight, physical ability, disability, intelligence, and more.  There are supposed superiors and inferiors in each of these categories.  ?Who determines who is which?  In our society from the beginning, it has been mostly white men in power. They like having this power.  It has enabled them to decide who belongs here in the good old USA, who can live in certain parts of town, who can shop, and where, who can walk on this sidewalk, who can own a home or car, who can attend quality schools, who can serve in certain offices. 

Those “superior white guys” have made a lot of money, influenced a lot of people, and done enormous harm because of their supposed superiority.  They have used their wiles and privilege to gain control throughout our government.  They think it is what the American people want because no one has actually stopped them yet.   

Now, and for decades, those rich white boys think it is not enough to decide who is superior and inferior throughout the society and broadcast it everywhere, they want to “alter” our history with what they are calling “the Real American History.”  They want that history to be white and male, kind of what it was when I first started learning history in 3^rd grade, 65 years ago.  Their expressed reason, so white children won’t feel uncomfortable!

That of course is a lie.  It is not their kiddies they are worried about because it is likely they have already indoctrinated them into whatever stories of history their white dads want to push on them.  This is about the white men feeling uncomfortable and they just can’t stand it.  They might be related to those white men who perpetrated enormous crimes throughout our history.

I am reading two books right now that make this pretty clear.  The first is Mother Emmanuel, Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church by Kevin Sack.  The second is The Killing of Crazy Horse by Thomas Powers.  In the first book, a horrific crime was committed 11 years ago when a young white man killed parishioners in a Black church, Mother Emmanuel A.M.E. in Charlston, SC.  The author describes the history of the work and struggles of the church, its members, and the segregation, lynchings, and other violence perpetrated on Black residents of the city, until very recently with no accountability.  The murderer of the members, who had invited them into their Bible Study,  had no remorse, claiming those he killed deserved it.  This is not even ancient history.  Where did the killer’s intense hate come from?  Hmmm!

White male relations with the various indigenous populations of North America have been fraught at best. If white men wanted land the people inhabited, too bad for the people because they would be driven out, murdered, or imprisoned so those white men could get hold of the land and its resources, Again, no accountability, even today. 

People were horrified when Custer’s troops were killed at the Little Big Horn, but those troops were out to murder as many of the Lakota as they could, assuming their superiority would give them automatic victory. That was in 1876.  Fourteen years later, other white troops massacred some old men, women, and children at Wounded Knee, for nothing, just because they could.  They imprisoned Native children and people with disabilities in horrible schools where the children were used and abused which should have been shocking, well, maybe they wouldn’t.  For all the cruelties done over time, they made up excuses, and  still do, just check out ICE and its attacks on immigrants of color, again with impunity!    As has often  happened, the military leader who ordered the massacre at Wounded Knee has been made a hero.

Yep, that’s how it has gone throughout history.  White men have raped and murdered women while blaming those women for “making them do it.”  They shoot LGBTQ+ people, leaving them to die, not because the person did anything to them, just because they exist.

The problem for rich and other conservative white men is that they are scared everyone else will learn the truth that they are just scared children who have learned to use privilege, money, and power to keep themselves from the knowledge that they are not superior, in fact, like everyone else, just ordinary.  They can’t have that, so they must rewrite history to suit their desperate need to be superior and have everyone around them under their heel.

Yo Conservative white men, we know who and what you are!  You are only fooling yourselves.  You forget that we the vast majority, have had to live with you forever.  We know!  You don’t need to white wash history because there will always be people who know the truth no matter how much you try to escape it.

This is not a condemnation of white men in general, just a chance to let those white supremacists who want to do harm to everyone who is not them, know that we a are not going to take it anymore.  We will be calling you out on your childish narcissistic need for recognition you don’t deserve. 

And, women, teachers, mothers, aunts, and grandmothers of white boys, do your best to keep those boys from developing the ego that puts all of us at risk, even themselves.  Help them develop a strong positive moral compass and encourage them to ask questions, Listen to others, communicate with and respect people different from themselves, and read them all sorts of stories, poems, and articles about or written by members of those groups.  The earlier you begin, the better.

I did learn I was different, but my family and friends will say that I didn’t let it stop me and nor should our differences stop anyone else from being the person you need to be, doing the things you need to do.  Then, we need to find ways to, as often as possible, remind the “superior” white boys they aren’t superior to us, no matter how hard they wish it to be true. 

EMBARRASSED, HORRIFIED, DISGUSTED!

Ruth A. Sheets

July 9, 2026

I once thought I just had some differences with Republicans and things could be worked out THROUGH HONEST DISCUSSION.  That is no longer the case no matter what Republicans may plead.  I realized that I now have 3 basic responses to whatever Republicans come up with since Trumplandia absorbed the Republican Party:  embarrassment, Horror, and Disgust, sometimes all present in a single speech, action, or declaration of Trumplandia.

This morning, I learned that our dear Congressional Republicans and possibly some Democrats too are planning to lower safety REGULATIONS on toxic chemicals, putting all of us, even the bribed recipients from chemical lobbyists AT RISK.  In my note to Congress below, I indicate which of the 3 (E,H,D) is my response to the statements.

“Do you all realize, particularly my senators, that lowering chemical safety standards will impact you too (D).  I think Republicans have forgotten to reason clearly while blinded by Trump's "glory" or something.  The earth is a closed ecosystem for the most part and when bad chemicals are released somewhere, they will eventually do harm other than at their starting point (D).  Those chemicals are often released on unsuspecting people,usually folks who are poor, non-white, or women and children (H). 

In my begging mode, I ask you to please oppose any effort to roll back the health protections in the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) (E).  That is really the least you should be doing in this time of environmental destruction and global warming.  Alas, you might need to take things a tiny bit at a time, just not making things worse. 

As you would know if you cared, current proposals being pushed by the chemical industry would dramatically weaken our nation's chemical safety law, making it easier for dangerous chemicals to enter the market (H).  It would also be harder for EPA and states to protect people from toxic chemicals linked to cancer, Parkinson's disease, impaired brain development, and other serious health problems (H).

In some cases, these proposals would provide fewer safeguards than Americans had more than 50 years ago.  Yeah, it is just so superior to go backward!  Even children know that makes no sense, but alas . . . (D).

As I mentioned, We the people need stronger protections from toxic chemicals—not weaker ones. OK, here comes the  begging again, please oppose any legislation that rolls back TSCA's health protections and stand up for the health of our families, workers, and communities (E).  We will be paying attention because it may well be our lives you are putting at risk.” 

There are many other instances of E,H,D.  The E is ever-present when Donald Trump speaks these days; he has no clue what he is talking about and simply does not care:  calling Democrats Communists, saying the war is over or will be over or something, getting the president of FIFA to release a player from a red card penalty, representing the US at a NATO meeting in Turkey. 

The H relates to the regime’s violence perpetrated without congressional approval:  Trump’s vanity war with Iran that our Baby Donnie and his inept, incompetent “negotiators” can’t figure out how to end if they even want to end it:  bombing a girls’ school on Netanyahu’s orders, using missiles to destroy small boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific claiming they were drug smuggling but with no proof, setting masked ICE nuts on immigrants and peaceful protesters.

The wrecking of our 250^th Birthday celebration of the “Declaration of Independence” was a resounding “D,” along with his reflecting pool stupidity and blaming innocent people for the destruction caused by an incompetent pool company and Trump’s need to run a motorcade over unset materials, etc.  I thought these would be embarrassing, but when the person orchestrating the events is an ignoramus with dementia, surrounded by a pool of incompetents, disgust is the thing I feel.  There is also some anger that Republicans, Musk‘s AIers, and some judges, returned Trump, an insurrectionist, to office.

Identifying whether this regime’s actions are E, H, or D, is like keeping score.  It helps me remember, when one votes for incompetence and incompetents, that is what we get.  Keep that in mind as the primaries wind down and the November midterm elections near.  We must be aware that Trump and his white house toddler pool are scared they might lose, so will do anything, including wrecking or stopping our elections to keep their ignorant, undeserved power.  They are already actively pushing again, the lie that non-citizens are voting.  They are threatening members of Congress that they must vote for the SAVE Act which would keep many American citizens from voting.  Their desperation is embarrassing, but disgusting and could be horrific if they win in November.  Beware!