A Sunday in 2018

 A Sunday in 2018

I love read to read and be informed. I look forward to an occasionally idle Sunday when I have time to read the two substantial newspapers that appear in my mailbox. I am passionate about the world my young grandchildren will inherit someday. Often my brain feels full of information after several hours of reading, but today it was more than that. It was full of despair.  I had to stop reading, go into the bathroom, shut the door and cry. Actual weeping for our country. Nothing in the news was making America great again, just more cruel, more hateful, more discriminatory.

The Supreme Court nominee will make it harder for people to have access to voting if he has his way, as if we were in the pre-Civil Rights era. Unions, which I supported and greatly benefitted from may become decimated; poor working conditions and inequity in pay will prevail once again. A story about the WWII Japanese internment camps in America tells of families taken from their homes out of irrational fear. The author reminds us not to repeat history—but we already are. Thousands of children remain separated from their parents at the southern border.  Imagine the damage being done to their psyches—all brought on by a party that claims to be pro-family and pro-life.  I read that no hugging is allowed in these child cages. An older sister could not comfort her three year-old brother. I cried. 

A friend tells me that her Japanese-American daughter-in-law and small grandson were harassed this week and called “F***king Chinks” at a Cleveland Indians baseball game. 

In the UK our president is being protested and made fun of everywhere he goes. This is not normal. It is not normal or safe for our country for him to constantly be alienating and insulting our allies around the world. But he wonders why he’s not welcome. 

On Facebook a distant relative cannot tolerate my views and harasses me mercilessly on my own post and timeline until I delete the whole thing and him as well.  I accept that he has different views than I do, but he cannot tolerate mine.  All of this is in my consciousness within two days. Does anyone else become overwhelmed?

After my tears over an America that I don’t recognize any longer I search for something uplifting and find a review of a documentary about Fred Rogers that is doing exceptionally well in the theaters. It says that people still want to see good. Yes, if we all were like Mr. Rogers and practiced kindness, tolerance and understanding our country would be a much different place, and I wouldn’t be crying at the news.