And in despair I hung my head...

I haven’t blogged in a long time. It’s not that I had nothing to say. Maybe I had too much to say, but I need to say something, anything.

On election day in 2016, I felt a despair for our country that I’d never felt before. The fascists had finally taken over democracy and we were all doomed. That feeling has worsened over the last months of worldwide panic over pandemics and economic hardship for so many. Over 105,000 Americans have died from Covid-19 and reports say death from other causes are up as well.

Which brings us to today. Our country is falling apart in every corner and the divide is growing and becoming more violent as I type. The president is threatening to send out the military to KILL AMERICAN CITIZENS if the governors won’t do it. People are protesting and rioting from coast to coast and the protests have spilled over into other countries as well.

Let me repeat that THE PRESIDENT IS THREATENING TO SEND OUT THE MILITARY TO KILL AMERICAN CITIZENS.

No, it’s not all because of the brutal senseless murder of George Floyd. His murder was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

We’ve all been inside for months (except those of us too stupid or too exceptional) because of the pandemic. Floyd was just the last murder in a long line of killings of POC that the police have basically gotten away with. We all saw it… we saw a man murdered!

Stop and think about that. We all saw a man murdered. By the police, people who swear an oath to protect and serve.

And our government has simply told us to shut up and move on or they will shoot us.

My despair is not the lone emotion I am feeling right now.

Rage – that my fellow Americans are so stupid and racist that they prefer a self-serving narcissist over experienced and intelligent candidates. Rage that my fellow North Carolinians are content to be uneducated, ignorant and bigoted, as they have been for the last 250 years.

Helplessness – that there is little I can do to change anything. I can do little things and I will but is it enough?

Shame – that I never understood how privileged I was to be white in this country, in the world at large. I was fooled into thinking that the world had changed, had gotten better. The racists, like the sleazy rats they are, had slunk away to lick their wounds and wait for their opportunity to come back out and infect a new generation with their vile ugliness. I am ashamed that I never saw it. I patted myself on the back and said I wasn’t a racist.

Guilt – that I patted myself on the back while people were abused and killed simply because they are not as pale as I am – an accident of fate.

I do not feel hopeful today. I see no way out of this right now. The election is a long way off and I am not sure the monster will go, even if defeated. The fascists and white supremacists have taken over the country and the government and I fear that we may fail in a way that makes Nazi Germany look benign.

Nope, I don’t feel hopeful at all.

Is there an answer?

You tell me. I can’t find one. I can’t see any scenario where we get back to the country we should be (not that we ever really did but we’ve been closer than we are now).

There it is… not sure writing made me feel any better. But there it is.