GOODBYE, GOODLUCK, AND GOOD RIDDANCE

 After the end of 2019, which was disastrous for us personally, from the standpoint of serious and multiple health issues, we thought, as we always try to do, that 'next year will be better'!  But that was because we were thinking only of our on personal issues.  

Actually, since the day after the presidential election in 2016, we had held to ourselves the concerns and fears of damage that a totally incapable president might do, but we also held tightly the thoughts that there are checks and balances written into the US Constitution that would protect us as a country.  Wow, were we mistaken!  

Now at the end of 2020, we find ourselves still dealing with personal health issues, living extremely quiet lives to avoid  exposure wo a world-wide pandemic, and every day seeing the current president break a Constitutional rule.  Disregarding every sort of effort to help our country (except for an ignorant proposal laced with selfish interests).  Apparently even more ignorant, if that is possible, of how real life in our country works than when he won office.  

Yes, we have to believe that things can begin to get better.  Yes, there will hopefully be accountability for the massive wrongs done to our country.  But the death toll is so unimaginable and so real, the damage to our economy is so heartbreaking, and the failure of one of the two major political parties to support their country rather than support whatever description one could apply to the president's current pattern of behavior:  this is stress beyond measure.  Sorrow beyond measure.  Disgust beyond measure.  

Let us hope we can still find hope.  

THE CRUELEST THING SO FAR

 Since the day after Election Day in November 2016, we have been dreading what someone such as the current president could do to our country.  However, we suffered from a failure of imagination when it came to the president's completely disastrous response to the pandemic.  Only just behind the president in horrific response has been his party's response to the suffering of our people.  Now, on the very eve of a pitiful, too late, too inadequate plan of assistance to desperate need of most of the American people, our tax money back to us for food and shelter, this president, this hollow creature with no ability to care, is threatening to hold the current plan up until who knows when.

If this were a movie, no one would believe it.  We shake our heads all the time, trying to figure out what to do.  We ourselves have basics, but the families, the children, the elderlies, the majority of Americans, are caught between a do-nothing Senate majority and a do-everything-bad president, and coming at the darkest time of the year, at the traditionally holiday season, there is only certain things that can be done right now.

We can help each other by sharing what we have.

We can hope that the new administration will be able to eventually hold accountable the people who are failing us.

And we can make sure our votes are made and counted and that we bring to office more people who care.

THE THRILL OF IT ALL

 This year, this year, has been a year that cannot be described in ordinary words such as 'difficult' or even 'horrific'.  As a planet, we passed 'horrific' back in the summer.  BUT there are still so many small, sometimes very small things we can find to give us joy, to give us a moment of peace.  We cannot compare the stress and inconvenience and frustration and yes, even fear, that most of us are experiencing'  with the stress of front-line workers, the desolation of loss of so many, the fear of loss of shelter and food.  These are terrible, unacceptable experiences for all our fellow humans.  

But if we can, and when we can, we can find a moment of laughter, a bit of relief from reality, in such very small things.  A dianthus plant blooming in December, tiny and fragrant:

And just today, a daughter calling and wondering if perhaps, just perhaps, we would like a gift of her wonderful home-made chocolate and peanut candy.  Not just the offer, but the priceless look of total delight on the faces of her father and brother, gave us all a few minutes of laughing and celebrating the offer and the anticipation.

There are many moments to mourn, just now, but there are also moments to rejoice, to listen to Christmas songs as if for the first time, to hope, to plan, to believe in the future.