Win
or Lose
“Sometimes
you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”
Dr.
Seuss
Yesterday,
I stood in a very long line at my polling place. The day was pretty and warm
for November. I took off my jacket to enjoy the sunshine. After about ten
minutes, a young woman came down from the polling place and said, “Anyone seventy
or over can go to the front of the line.” It was the first time being old gave
me a minor advantage and I almost didn’t take it because I was enjoying being “one
of many.” The line was orderly, the mechanism for casting a ballot worked just
fine, and none of the predicted disturbances happened. All in all, it was a pleasant
experience in a year in which they are in short supply.
I think
when we look back on the election of 2020, regardless of who wins the
presidency, we will remember it as the year the electorate woke up. People of
all stripes realized that this election was not one that could be ignored, so
they went out to vote. I read this morning that this was the biggest voter turn
out in 120 years. That is always good news even if my candidates don’t win.
Sometimes
we can only see the value of things in retrospect. When Trump took office, I
said that he was a “trickster.” In fairytales the trickster is the character
that shakes things up—that turns complacency on its head and shakes the status
quo like a rag doll. That he has done to the deep chagrin of many of us. He has
taken our institutions—including the ones that we thought little about before—and
systematically dismantled them. He has placed people who previously hated agencies
in leadership positions in them expressly to undermine their operation. All the
environmental protections that we have come to love have been scrapped in favor
of exploitation and fracking. We have watched our place in the world diminish
month by month in favor of “me first.” And we have watched civil unrest that
has not been seen in sixty years. Oh, yes, the trickster has been at work.
And, as
much as I hate to give him credit for anything, he has caused all of us to wake
up and, if not smell the roses, at least watch them burn. We have become aware
of the army of people who have felt threatened and disenfranchised; including
those who harbored hatred toward black and brown people and feared losing their
way of life. Whoever wins or loses, we now know that we have that level of
discontent and must work to make it better. We have Trump to thank for this
awakening—even though it has been a nightmare.
I leave
you this morning with the words of the late, great John Lewis: “If you’re
not hopeful and optimistic, then you just give up. You have to take a long,
hard look and just believe that if you’re consistent, you will succeed.” And
this from Sir Winston Churchill: “Success is not final. Failure is not
fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts.” We are here. And we will
persist.
In
the Spirit,
Jane
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