I started off this scary week planning to write a post under the title, “Good News — That Man Doesn’t Interest Me Any More.”
That man had gone down in defeat in November, he was out of my life for good, or would be soon, and now, finally, I could safely turn my attention to normal life — to vacuuming up the months-old dust balls under the bed or assessing the new guy’s picks for the next administration.
I could live my life again.
Earlier this week, I noticed to my surprise that I no longer needed to follow the ins and outs of the daily news cycle as I had over the past four years: Two newspapers over breakfast. A cable news station running most of the day. TV pundits over dinner.
For months I had waited and waited for this axe to fall, for that man to be out of office and out of my life for good.
And now the axe had fallen, and I found myself switching off cable news and turning on NPR. Listening to things like “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” and “The Moth Radio Hour.”
I had lost interest in that man. He was fading from my consciousness. It was wonderful
But, one of the things (just one) that man wants and cannot do without is the outraged attention of people like me. People who actually believe in things like the American experiment, human kindness, truth, law, and order. He feeds on outrage. He does everything he can to provoke it.
Everything. Including siccing his goons on the building down the street and on the men and women inside doing their duty on Wednesday.
That man got my attention back this scary week. He had me back in his grip. But this time it wasn’t with mere words. It was with an attack on the institutions of American government.
I was outraged. But I didn’t want to react to that unhinged man’s need for attention. I didn’t want to add another 650 polarizing words to the billions he had incited over the past four years. Most of all, I didn’t want to spend time thinking about him.
I had to ditch my “Good News — That Man Doesn’t Interest Me Any More” post, of course. But what to write about in its place? If not this scary week’s events and the disturbed human being who inspired them, then what?
I could not think of a thing. I was speechless.
This rarely happens to me. There’s always something hanging around in my brain, waiting to be written about. Sometimes it’s some biggish thing, like my daughter’s wedding dress. Or, it could be something more pop culture, like fathers, sons and the Super Bowl.
But there I was yesterday, at a loss for something to say to you. Yes, my outrage was triggered by that man and his attacks on the institutions of American government, but I wanted to keep my outrage to myself. I didn’t want to let him get under my skin.
That’s when I noticed that the camellias outside our living room window were blooming. Again. There they were, doing what camellias do. Turning dirt and rain and sunlight into symmetry. Into complexity. Into what registers on the human eye as beauty.
Those camellia bushes have been blooming for Jon and me every winter since we moved into our house forty-three years ago. Their steadfastness in showing up for this scary week reminded me that, yes, a real life awaits me and all of us. That man will exit the house he’s living in. And ultimately good people and their 232-year-old document will prevail.
The process will be lengthy and probably grueling, but it will happen. I believe that.
And so, indulge me, dear readers. Deep down, this is a post about camellias, isn’t it?
Afterthoughts. That Scary Week. January 17, 2021
Sad to say, in the days after this post was written, we all learned that the events of January 6 were more than just a bunch of hot-headed citizens swarming into the Capitol building at the behest of a poor loser in the White House.
January 6 was a day of violence, death, desecration, and possibly attempted assassination, a day in which people sought to take down our 250-year-old government and its constitution.
Donald Trump might — or might not — fade from the scene and from my consciousness. But it looks like thousands of people across the country believe him when he says he was defrauded on Nov. 3. They’ve also heard him say, “When you catch somebody in a fraud, you are allowed to go by very different rules.”
Different rules? I’m worried.
More Afterthoughts. A Hope-Full Week. January 23, 2021
I put aside my to-do list on Wednesday and watched the Inauguration celebration the whole day long — from the swearing-in, to the walk to the White House door, to Katy Perry’s explosive rendering of “Firework.” By day’s end, I had my country back.
I agree with both you and Ann. This is a very scary time and up to now, seemed so far removed from what could possibly happen in our country. Well, it has happened. And now it’s going to be up to our Representatives and the new administration to determine who will be held accountable and what consequences will ensure. Impeachment seems a good place to start. And contrary to the opinions of some, I don’t believe it will further divide the country that is already divided. We’ll see.
I love your camelias! They were my mother’s favorite flower.
Thanks, Ann. I’m hoping for the best. I did enjoy that week or two of respite when I thought that man and the damage he was doing was fast fading from the scene. And I’m with you, we have to hold people accountable.
Wonderful that flowers being us a sense of renewal. Hope is a medicine for me.
Hopefully, by the time the camellias bloom again the US of A will be back on track.
That is soothing, Barb. I want to believe that life can and will go on. But I feel the future is tenuous. Just as I believe ‘normal’ post-pandemic is going to be different in many, many ways from what it was before, I worry that democracy as we knew it before ‘that man’ is fading if not gone due to the millions who believe his lies about a stolen election. The breadth and depth of that population threatens democracy as we knew it fundamental ways, I fear.
Thanks, Ann. I actually share your concerns about both the pandemic and the threats to democracy. I’m very worried. I soothe myself with camellias. But I do also hold out hope that “the new guy’s” awareness of the feelings of dislocation and loss among blue collar working people might lead to bringing much of “that population” back into the mainstream.
I spent a year in Germany after college. I went there with the question, “How could a people behave as the Germans did under the Nazis?” I came away with the strong belief that any people, including Americans, could behave that way, given the right circumstances. The question is, are we in the U.S. now or will we be in the future, in those circumstances? We’ll see.
PS. It’s my opinion that the psychological and social forces that gave rise to Nazi Germany and to Wednesday’s assault on the Capitol are latent in every society. The challenge is to restore them to their latent state here in the U.S.