Okay, I’m upbeat and forward-looking by nature, but it’s not healthy to stay calm and reasoned in my country right now.
I’m sick of the tension, sick of the confusion, sick of the division, sick of being surprised, shocked, and bewildered.
My tired mind is turning to fantasy while the world waits.
I actually had a dream last night in which New York State and New England (maybe New Jersey and Delaware too) decided to secede and become one giant province of Canada or an independent country.
California would probably secede on its own. I’m sure Canada would let us fly back and forth over their airspace if the old U.S. got snippy.
I’m no saint, as my wife can testify. Yesterday I was full of hope and good heart, today I’m just tired and pissed off. It’s good for me, perhaps for you too.
I should say I still feel Joe Biden will win, but the moral reckoning I felt sure was coming was not.
I’m tired of Donald Trump and the people who excuse him so much. It is obvious that they are tired of me.
They each deserve the other, as we do, and good riddance to them. Let them see what Donald Trump’s country looks like in a couple of years. (A clue: It looks being trapped in a Fox News opinion broadcast every day for the rest of your life.)
If they hate us so much that they want to make us cry, I thought, then I’m sure they wouldn’t mind if we left and set up in our own country. Think about it.
Women could control their own bodies, help the poor and the needy, the government could get us through pandemics and great fires and floods, and finally produce good jobs for people working on new technology to help us stop polluting the earth.
Imagine for a moment living in a country where the world’s most respected infectious disease specialist just told us what we needed to do to stop a vicious virus, and we did it? It would be long gone by now.
Imagine living in a country where it still seemed creepy to separate children from their parents at the border. Imagine a country where corrupt leaders who were impeached for abusing their power were actually removed from office and punished.
Imagine a country where they still believed in science and thought trying to save the earth was almost as important as the stock market.
Imagine a country where the courts made fair, not political or extremist rulings based on the law, not states’ color.
Imagine if we lived in a country where elections were about choosing good leaders, not making people cry.
Imagine we were living in a country where our children and businesses didn’t profit from taxpayers.
The other side seem to live for peeing on us every chance they get; I can take a hint. We seem to be a country that is sick of one another.
High-minded Abraham Lincoln loved the idea of a Union. Still, maybe we’ve been married long enough and become one of those couples that have nothing to say to each other any longer and sit silently staring at their food when they go out to eat (you remember going out to eat?).
They could do what they want; we could do what we want.
They could ride around all day in big trucks waving their automatic rifles around like mechanical penises and puff up their chests at each other. You show me yours, dude, and I’ll show you mine. Then let’s go and massacre a couple of hundred soda cans.
The country would be a white man’s paradise. There would be no need for militias and white nationalist cabals. The whole country would be one.
People of color would get right over to our new America. They would be welcome. We would have to do something about the Native Americans, who have been through this before.
Even a few days ago, this would have seemed like blasphemy, as I do love my country, and most mornings (yesterday), I do believe we will get to a better place, by necessity, if nothing else.
Sooner or later, we will have to start talking and listening to one another. Not yet, it seems.
But I wouldn’t say I like living in America this week. Yesterday I joined the Poor People’s Campaign and prepared to do some healing good to join the revolution’s moral values.
Today, I’m weary and angry and am having secession dreams. I’m tired of masks, pandemics, politicians, and e-mail asking me for money one last time.
I think this secession fantasy is my subconscious way of letting off some steam and permitting myself to say, “boy, this really sucks.” It does feel good to shout it out. Maybe I’ll skip meditation today and go out and scream at the sheep.
Today, I’m not sure what it means to be an American. I’m pretty sure what it doesn’t mean; I guess that’s what is bothering me.
I don’t intend to spend my life going online for the latest bit of unsettling news, the fading hopes of millions of frightened people.
I’m really sick of TV anchors and their space maps of multi-colored voting blocks and touch-tone stats. I get a headache just from looking at them call up all those stats of the past.
Can someone just tell me who is winning? I don’t care what Bejesus county did eight years ago. More boys having fun with their toys.
This week is soul-draining. Maybe secession is not such a bad idea after all. I’m sick of all their whining and bitching about us. I don’t care to live in a world where shitheads in big trucks with giant flags.
I’ll bounce back, there is all sort of good work to be done, and I want to do some of it.
I spent a few hours last night trying to understand why so many Americans now see the world in a completely different way than I do.
And then I had that dream about seceding. We could do it peacefully. I have a feeling this President wouldn’t really care. He is not much like Lincoln when I think about it. And I don’t really have to think about it.
I imagined the new nation as a kind of cultural nirvana. Quiet, no angry tweets to start the day. I will say this for President Trump. Many more people love him dearly than will ever love me, and that is also something I need to think about.
Whoever wins the presidency seems the big loser this week is America, torn, frightened, angry, and confused. This is no victory for either side, no matter who wins.
“Whatever the final vote, it is already clear that the number of Americans saying “Enough is enough,’ was not enough,” said Dov Seidman, an expert on leadership and the author of the book “How: Why How We Do Anything Means Everything.”
There was no blue wave, he said, “but more importantly, there was no moral wave. There was no widespread rejection of the kind of leadership that divides us, especially in a pandemic.”
We are farther apart than ever and face months, if not many years of conflict, anxiety, and bitter disagreements. And I don’t even want to think about the damage Trump and his people can do over the next four years.
It almost has to get worse before it gets better. This doesn’t mean I can’t have a good life or won’t have one, but it does mean I have to take some deep breaths every morning to get set for the day—what a mess Donald Trump has made of our country.
I know I’m not alone. I have many readers and followers on my blog, and they see the world the way I do in most cases. I feel fortunate in that, and I know my work is supported and appreciated. I also have great dogs and two sweet donkeys.
The center of my life revolves around Maria and my farm. But my newly restored heart is bleeding a bit.
I’ve been working hard to try to grasp why the things I find so disturbing about Donald Trump – his cruelty, dishonesty, narcissism, and governing incompetence – not only don’t bother half of the country, but they love him for it.
Nothing he does matters; he is worshipped. He seems to be correct when he says he is responsible for nothing; at least, that’s what his supporters believe.
I sometimes feel the whole idea of Trump and Trumpism is to give the finger to people like me and me. Okay, you win. We’re crying. Let my people go.
I didn’t see Trump coming in 2016, and I didn’t see Election Day coming this time. Buyer beware. I did better, but not good enough. Sorry about that.
Everything I dislike, they love, and everything I love, they dislike. I have my arrogant moments, but I am not so arrogant that everything I believe is necessarily true or correct.
More than 234,000 Americans have died from Covid-19, and our leaders insist it’s no big deal and will soon pass. How can this be okay? It can’t be for me.
Perhaps I have to learn to think differently, to clear my head of misconceptions and prejudices. I call this inverse reasoning. Everything I believe is wrong, everything they believe is right. Perhaps that will help me to see it.
Easier said than done. Maybe we should let them be them, and us be us and create a new nation out of New York and the New England states.
I e-mailed a good friend and said, “Hey, here’s a crazy idea!. What about seceding…I think they’d love for us to go.”
I expected a quick blast telling me I was nuts.
“Hmmm.,” he said, “let’s talk a little more about that.”
Ouch. I didn’t have the heart to say I was kidding…sort of. I’ll feel better tomorrow.
I totally empathize! Instead of dreaming of secession, I dream of moving to Costa Rica!
I had that dream the other day..I do still believe Biden will win, but there wasn’t the moral uprising I felt and predicted..
Take North Carolina, please!
Thank you. You are the bright spot of my days.
Thank you thank you Jon! You have given me peace throughout this season. I love your honesty and no bull shit way of writing. And yes, that gives me great peace!
Me too. I had a small fight with my husband over it last night because he didn’t grasp how serious I was about it. I’m forwarding him your essay. You out the exact way I felt and the reasoning behind it, in words, way better than the ones I had last night to explain it.
Paula, are we married to the same person? On some level I wish I could be less effective by all that Jon has expressed but I can’t. I have finally gotten my husband to turn off the sound on the news when I enter the room. It’s torturous for me! I told him that I may be depressed and destroyed after the last vote is counted, but I refuse to stress and give myself more anxiety by listening to what Jon has described of the media coverage. I feel like I am caught in a vortex of somber and hopeless thoughts and i don’t need the talking heads to make me feel worse.
.
You wrote what I’ve been feeling. Couldn’t have said it better. Thanks
I’d love to join this country you dreamt of with morals and ethics and love.
Great post, Jon. Why not let ALL the others secede to some faraway island or maybe a galaxy far, far away and we’ll stay in our beautiful country and restore it ? Cleaner, healthier, kinder, more equal…my fantasy for years. Thanks again for writing what so many others are thinking as well.
Thanks for putting into words the soul bruising feelings I have. I am so ashamed and heartbroken that this country has devolved into such a hotbed of hate and bigotry. I haven’t given up all hope. Thanks for reminding us to look for good and to do good.
I’m in for the secession! :>)
I also despair of ever understanding why Trump is so adored. I’m beginning to ask myself, “Could it be religion?” The legality of abortion is a really big deal to those who believe God has created life at conception. There’s lots of voters who vote against abortion legality regardless of any other issues. And, are clergy possibly preaching against liberal viewpoints in general? I truly am not bashing religion. Just trying to understand.
Yes. Look at the red-blue map when this is over and you’ll see the east and west coasts (including the southwest states of Nevada, New Mexico and now Arizona) solid blue. Everything else as red as Nate Silver’s face may be about now. Assuming Biden is president, the House of Representatives slightly less democratic as they lose some seats to the Republicans, and Mitch McConnell resurrects his promise to make Obama (now Biden) a one-term President, and Trump eligible to run for reelection in 2024, and we will have the next 4 years of continuous rancor and zero progress on climate or economic inequality or anything else. Time to acknowledge Humpty Dumpty can’t be put back together again.
I have no idea what the answer is to my question … but I wonder if Civics and American History (of course we know how revisionist that is) have been required courses in high schools in the last 30 or so years. Civics lets (makes) students explore the history of our representative democracy so they are at least exposed to how our government should work along with the rights and responsibility of citizenship. I have a feeling most people don’t have a clue. No clue? No care.
I sooooo agree
I feel your pain. Assuming Biden wins, there will still be a horrific uphill battle to right the wrongs that have been inflicted on our nation.
I don’t get why people are not expressing a huge amount of moral outrage. Is their love of money as depicted by the stock market so intense that it belittles all else of importance? What happened to caring for the truly poor and needy? Do many states in American consider themselves the poor and needy and therefore must protect their interests at all costs? I will be interested to see what the vote breakdown is for Evangelicals as they had already gotten the judges they wanted; so are they sticking with Trump or did they turn away? They are the ones who I would expect the most from in terms of moral outrage.
Personally, I wish secession were an option. The people I most identify with are here in the northeast and California. What would the rest of the country do without the influx of taxpayer money from these states? What about the cultural centers is these states? Would we be missed?
I am a conservative in my personal life, but I don’t believe in returning America to a time when equality was lacking. We still have a long way to go to make things fair and equal for everyone, so the idea of going backward is repulsive to me. Where is everyone’s sense of right and wrong? Scripture has a lot to say about this topic and “seared consciences”. Are we so far removed from considering God’s view of our behavior as individuals and as a country, that we can’t see that He has blessed us tremendously over the years but His blessing going forward is not guaranteed?
I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for all your political writing over the last many months. It has been a place of calm when the rest of the media is in an uproar. I have truly appreciated that!
Nancy
I am sorry you say good riddance to anyone who voted for Donald Trump. I don’t feel that way about those who voted for Joe Biden.
I’m sorry too Ron, too many people in big trucks giving the finger as they drive by the farm every day with their huge flags flying…I know that is not something you would do. I think Trump’s contempt for people like me is quite clear, and I do not feel that way either about all Trump supporters as I’m sure you know..I can’t join that community of enablers and it breaks my heart to see Christian Nationalism grow so rapidly..Hope you are well, miss you.
Hey Jon, I get it! But I also know that one reason it makes me feel so tired is that it leaves the responsibility squarely on me. I can’t go to my “to do” list and check off “partisan divide”. I cannot leave collaboration, compassion, understanding, and compromise to the folks in Washington DC. I have to do it myself …in my home, on my streets, in my neighborhood, town, city…and every relationship. That’s where the real work has always been done! I know a guy who started an Army of Good. THAT’S what I’m talkin’ about!
I am with Susan. Regardless of the outcome, our task is the same. To turn inward and find the best in ourselves and reach out to the “other.” As the Dalai Lama says so eloquently, we all want the same thing. We all want happiness, we all want love. We are all in this together no matter how large our differences may appear at any given moment. Healing cannot begin until we understand the wound. Now we know. Now the healing can begin, and it is always darkest before the dawn.
“Please call me by my True Names”
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow— even today I am still arriving.
Look deeply: every second I am arriving to be a bud on a Spring branch, to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings, learning to sing in my new nest, to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.
I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, to fear and to hope. The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death of all that is alive.
I am a mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river. And I am the bird that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.
I am a frog swimming happily in the clear water of a pond. And I am the grass-snake that silently feeds itself on the frog.
I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, my legs as thin as bamboo sticks. And I am the arms merchant, selling deadly weapons to Uganda.
I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat, who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am also the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving.
I am a member of the politburo, with plenty of power in my hands. And I am the man who has to pay his “debt of blood” to my people dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.
My joy is like Spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth. My pain is like a river of tears, so vast it fills the four oceans.
Please call me by my true names, so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, so I can see that my joy and pain are one.
Please call me by my true names, so I can wake up and the door of my heart could be left open, the door of compassion.
I thought there would be a moral uprising too. I just feel sick. Half the people in our country don’t care that everyday we are losing around 1,000 people or more. Yesterday the death toll was well over 1,000. I do believe the number of dead is near 250,000. If this keeps up many of our physicians and healthcare workers will QUIT! What kind of lunatic declares he has won the election when he hasn’t. We all knew the orange king and his family wouldn’t go gentle into the night. It’s been nuts from the start. He gives his “unqualified” daughter, son and son-in-law positions of power in the White House. This is a democracy not a monarchy. They never belonged there. He surrounds himself with criminal types and won’t listen to experts and if you don’t kiss his royal fat ass you get fired. His lying is psychopathic. But a lie told enough is often believed. I wonder what Canada is like this time of year.
Who would we be? The Eastern states of Canada? As a New Englander I have to wonder. I, too was hoping for a moral landslide. Most of my republican friends can’t stand rump.
It seems to me the only sensible thing would be for the so called blue state s to secede. I don’t see how the two sides will ever have enough respect for each other to compromise or work together. Frankly, I don’t want anything to do with them anymore than they do with me.
My daughter wants to move her siblings to Costa Rica. She has visited several times and loves it. I have heard many of the ‘red ‘ states talk time and again about secession. The running joke in our family is’ great ‘. Let them leave. Most of them couldn’t sustain a decent economy without major help from us northern states. We send more money to the federal government to subsidize them then we get back in federal dollars. They really don’t have much incentive to help better their own citizens. Look at how they fought the affordable care act. My point is that you are not alone in fantasizing about this. The only difference is where we want to go!!
Hmm. That’s an interesting proposition. I live in a “red” state and we export a ton of natural resources to support the “blue” states–energy, minerals, water, timber, and food. Not to mention taxpayer dollars (because my state’s constitution blessedly prohibits operating in the red).
It may be helpful to compare notes a bit. For example, Obamacare was a disaster in my state–most people who were insured, can no longer afford the few available policies ($1-2,000/per month per person, $15,000-$20,000 deductibles, $80,000 total coverage caps). That’s our reality and consequently I hope you’ll respect that I find the ACA a debacle. We may all legitimately have different experiences and viewpoints, and failing to recognize that is part of our collective problem right now.
It is also interesting that people from CA and NY are literally flooding into my state right now. . . .
The last four years, I’ve gone to your site when I feel extra frustrated by politics and wait for you to tell me the silver lining. In some ways, it is satisfying to see you as fed up as others. But mostly it’s sad. I think we all wanted people to come out and say they won’t stand for white supremacy and a horrible covid response. And not only did that not happen but we are locked in a dead heat with our own fellow statesmen in a seemingly unmoveable moral divide. When Biden wins the nightmare won’t be over, we will have a LONG road ahead of us. It’s understandable to be exhausted and worried about it. I agreed with a lot of this article and think you and your readers might find it to be interesting reading as well –> https://annehelen.substack.com/p/it-is-not-going-to-feel-how-you-want
Agree with everything you’ve said … but please don’t scream at the sheep. They seem to love Maria and would have voted for Biden if she told them to. ?
I would never take it out on the sheep.:)
I am Canadian. We would welcome many of you…but here is the rub. You have to leave a few things behind and I am not sure you can do that. Yes…we have universal health care; BUT that means you do not get to jump the queue. Yes we are more peaceful; BUT you do NOT get to bring your guns, nor your attitude towards guns, especially hand guns. Yes we are far more polite/modest; BUT that means you do not get to redefine good or success; also, we are not perfect so do not claim or expect the rottenness of perfection. Yes we aim to elect the candidate and party that best represents our heart; BUT you do not get to eliminate all choice but 2, nor set immutable election dates, nor pour obscene amounts of money at our elections. If you were to come here…you do not get to change our ways because you are better than all others….you get to add to our mosaic. BUT you have to be OK with following rules without denigrating them or considering it admirable to break them. Work towards changing bad rules BUT with intelligence, persuasion and kindness. PLEASE… 🙂
this is so well said
I live near Canada (in Montana), have many Canadian friends, and respect your post and sentiments, Sue. I would piggy-back on it and offer similar comments to the HUGE influx of urban folks (literally hundreds of CA and NY license plates in my little town of 7000) from New York and California flooding during the last 3 months into Montana in unprecedented droves right now, buying property within hours of its listing literally sight-unseen (and, sadly, now bringing us from the lowest Covid-19 rates in the nation to now the highest). Please recognize that if you like our way of life well enough to move here, do not try re-make us into what you left. Respect who we are and how we operate. We have zero desire to be broke and socialist like California, nor will we tolerate the violence of urban NYC, Portland, and other cities; we respect our law enforcement. Those sentiments cross the aisle here among both Democrats and Republicans–clearly reflected in our election results– just as they do throughout much of the center of the country.
These came out a long while ago but you may enjoy them while you’re having a bad day. Hopefully everything
looks better in the morning.
Enjoy.
Dear Red States, we’re leaving..
http://www.chem.ucla.edu/~ltfang/humors/toredstates.html
and Time for a Bluexit
https://newrepublic.com/article/140948/bluexit-blue-states-exit-trump-red-america
I’ve always considered you more intelligent than what you are expressing. Can’t believe anyone would want this country to go to socialism!
The problem is, in some of the “red” states, there are whole areas that are solidly blue and would want to join you, Most of my state of Ohio is red, but Cincinnati is solidly blue. Our commissioners here are 3 female Democrats, two will be black. Our new sheriff will be a lesbian Democrat. Our elections just ousted a bunch of long-time Republican judges in favor of slew of Democrats. Our county has become so Democratic, that the Republicans had to do a ridiculously extreme gerrymandering hatchet job on our area to keep longtime Congressman Chabot in office. Yet, take a trip across the state to SE Ohio, where my cousins reside, and you will find lots of the most ardent Trump devotees ever, and few Democrats.. This is true in many Midwestern and Southern states. We have relatives in Atlanta and Clearwater who abhor Trump and all he stands for, although they live in red states. Too often the people in the Midwest and South all get lumped into one group.
I don’t want to succeed, but I do feel your pain. You have espoused so closely how I feel today, my wife said it sounds like something I would write.
I love my country, I love my state, but increasingly I can’t understand how the people I have known and interacted with for decades could feel so differently than I do. Am I that poor of a judge of character? Yet I can’t see myself unfriending them, more like I have lost respect for them and that is worse. I’ve known many of these people sixty years but obviously I didn’t know them.
I will stay and fight to the bitter end, I have invested my life in this farm and want to be buried here in an unmarked grave so no one can ever separate me from this place.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts today, it is always a comfort to know one is not alone in their beliefs.
May peace abide with you.
I feel so much of what you say speaks to and for me. One difference is that my particular dream often is to return to the country of my birth – Canada. I hear rumors that they are preparing to welcome home Canadians living in the “States” as they say. Canada is not perfect, but my experience has always been that the people are generally kinder and more generous in respect for each other. And there is my personal experience: My heart sings whenever I am visiting in Canada. Your dream is not so far fetched. We have had civil war before. But would pray it could be done without war. A fantasy, I suppose, but a comforting one. Thank you for consistently sharing from your (healing) heart. I rejoice in your recovery
Re “I spent a few hours last night trying to understand why so many Americans now see the world in a completely different way than I do.”, I think we were not paying attention, reaching out, meeting and discussing in churches, town meetings, local rituaks and functions, instead we sat behind our computers, interacted only with those like ourselves when forces were affecting negatively most of the working class. “Donald Trump channels the anger that non-college-educated workers and families feel in the face of automation, offshoring manufacturing, rapid cultural change and shifts in social status.” https://news.stanford.edu/2020/11/04/no-matter-wins-2020-election-governing-will-difficult/
And too many of the elites are gaining too much financial and political control. (And the judiciary is becoming too inbred. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/law/2020/nov/05/trump-lawyers-supreme-court-brett-kavanaugh)
If we do not help change the effect of “automation, offshoring manufacturing, rapid cultural change and shifts in social status,” we have let our neighbors, our country and the hope of democracy down.
“Giving the finger as they pass thev farm”?? Well , theyre reading your missives. Maybe there’s an opportunity there.
I and many millions living across the Atlantic, are shaken to the core. To think, despite all he is – lying, narcissistic personality – nearly half of America loveing this man is incomprehensible. Jon, all those humanely good dreams that you describe are clearly mentioned and are set out by the forefathers but they are just empty words in the present-day Republican minds.
Even if Biden wins, the moral story tells us the truth. Americans are willing and ready to live with lies and deception and accept a sociopath to lead their country. May be its time to reverse the immigration process and look across the Atlantic for a new home and I am sure it will guarantee a better place for the children and grand children.
Jon, you tell it like it is. Colorado is on our collective side. And if not, do you have a spare bed in the barn?
Here I and my husband are in sane little Delawaren.
I shared your fantasy last night as I lay awake.
We are old–in our 80s, and death looks like a deliverance. This is so sad.
My husband and I are right there with you! Except we live in rural area if the Blue Ridge in Virginia. This morning felt like a grey cloud was hanging over my head and thoughts of secession have haunted the back roads of my mind lately even though I love my country. But I think we need to figure out why this is happening and try to move forward. It is always refreshing to read your blog, Jon. Thank you for your honesty. You are right – sometimes you just have get there anger and frustration out and then go forward.
My Plan has been to avoid the election news until there’s a result. I follow what’s going on locally and elsewhere without reading presidential election news. Not knowing if it is safe to read the paper my mouse flies down the page to safety below the fold. I ran into a friend and blurted, “Don’t tell me anything!” He and his lady are also on a news embargo, as well as other people I know so, apparently, it’s a thing.