Fever

I'm not saying anything any of us haven't said before but I have to ask, How did we find ourselves in this muck and how the f... are we going to break the fever? It feels like half the country has long Covid and the other half has rabies. And to hell with vaccinations, right? Unless we do away with the dregs of the once (mostly) beloved Kennedy clan--okay, so it wasn't ever really Camelot. I get that. No one's gene pool is perfect. But this guy?

Anyway, back to the cure. I'm looking for new ideas. Do we just linger here, sweating it out, hoping to outlive the virus despite the likelihood of recovering in a significantly weakened state? Is there some way to fight this disease that we haven't yet discovered? Or alternatively, do we just give up and die? If we outlive it, will we find the strength, the leadership to recover and possibly build a "more perfect union?"

Let's face it, this Union, this United States, has never been what we thought it was back when we believed that hiding under the wooden bench in our elementary school's corridors when the air raid sirens sounded would protect us from bombs. Those were the good old days. When, every day, we said the “pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.” When we pledged to a nation representing “Liberty and Justice for all.” It sounded like a good idea when we first read in the Declaration of Independence that all men were created equal...it still sounds like a good idea, though it hasn't really worked out for everyone, has it? George Orwell seemed to have it right, when he said in Animal Farm that "Some … are more equal than others." How did we not notice? Now, I don't mean, of course, that some are created more equal, only that by virtue of this or that characteristic or religion or financial status or whatever political belief is 'in' at the moment, they find themselves more (or less) equal.

Anyway, I'm just saying, what I thought we were turned out not to be what we actually were, despite the best efforts of many of us to live up to those ideals. So disappointing. What we were taught we were, based on those early words of this country's founders, wasn't even what we were when they spoke those words. Or possibly, not even what they meant. And after decades of efforts to move us closer to what those of us who were breast fed on those ideals thought the country stood for, and believing that we had, in fact, made progress toward those aims, we find ourselves, today, mired in the quicksand of half the nation who never even believed in or wanted those ideals. Instead, they’ve swallowed whole the false promises of the leaders of a new movement, promises they’ll never keep, promises even more hollow than those made by the founders who may, at least, have had better intentions. Or maybe not. We’ll never know. But we know where we are now, sinking swiftly, having lost whatever ground we thought we had gained.

So what now? Any creative ideas? I love who I thought this country was. I loved that I thought we cared about all our citizens. Now I see that half the country doesn’t care about anyone but themselves. And they’re not even being very smart about taking care of themselves! They’re trusting their wellbeing to someone who doesn’t give a damn even about them.