Looking forward to this opportunity to join hands around the table, my view is interrupted by noxious clouds. Tribal thickets of extreme partisanship are set afire by angry citizens. Righteous indignation blocks the sun, making the air we breathe rancid.
What to do? Fantasy football and Pokemon Go, stalking what might be? Partisan politics, stoking scorn for the "other side"? Taking to the streets to express outrage at the murder by police of black men, taking to the internet to defend or attack, taking care to avoid certain topics in conversation?
What are we doing? Taking sides. After all, we love a dialectic. But this time the necessary listening and rebutting of a constructive dialogue are missing in action. Yes, this time things are different as conversation is drowned out by shouting.
My bias is evident. I'm drawn to vigorous debate and utterly put off by the Politics of Blame. I'm not willing to give up on the optimism generated in the 2008 election, as the We candidate scored a decisive victory over the They mentality. Even my dyed-in-the-wool positive attitude is creaking and groaning under the onslaught of hatred and negativity catalyzed by Trump.
This man has gobbled up our airwaves because the "media" love to cash in on a spectacle. He posits that the real truth is to be gleaned on the internet. And his followers, who comprise at least a third of my fellow Americans (!), are still eating it up. Donald is no Pandora, but he certainly has let loose the goblins of bigotry and hatred. What used to be said behind closed doors is now being shouted from the rafters. Seeing this perverse "coming out" of the millions of fellow citizens who, like their bloated cheerleader, also feel unshackled and feel empowered not just to be politically incorrect, but to retch up all the hatred of the "other" that they've been bottling up for who knows how long.
This is what has me feeling sad, even distraught. Living in my liberal county and my upscale neighborhood, I've been able to kid myself for years about my neighbors from other states. My state of inclusiveness and brother&sisterhood has been quaked by inhabitants of the State of Hate. Now don't get me wrong. I cannot see those whose opinions clash with mine as "bad people." They are fearful people, often ignorant and easily enflamed. Stoked by rightwing internet sites and emboldened by Fox News, eager to find who to blame, they are an easy target for the Orange Piper of Doom.
Yes, the stomach-clenching ugliness we are all in the middle of has stirred up my own fears. Instead of seeing the continuous progress from prejudice to respect that has been the rising line of my sixty-six years, I'm now confronted with the seething underbelly of our bright democracy.
Come on, you say. The election will come and go and we can return to our Happy Days. But can we? Can I pretend that this has been a midsummer nightmare? No, friends, I cannot. How I am choosing to respond is by re-learning to love my neighbors, be they in Alabama or Ohio, be they rednecks or alt-rights.
Let the work of listening and trying to understand how we got here be our work. And all the while, let us gather in gratitude, make music and get up off our tuchases and dance together.