If you are a trump supporter, stop reading right now! If we are still friends, let's just call it good for now, and hope that we are still friends after that bloated gas bag openly selling his Presidential favors for millions of dollars, among other egregious, immoral, illegal and disgusting acts, is gone.
The terror among US citizens of Mexican lineage, of Native American heritage, of any brown-skinned ethnicity is a blight on each of us. The innocent baby tear gassed in its parents' car by ICE "agents". The women slammed to the pavement, violently clubbed, choked. People taken off the streets and disappeared into the black hole of racial hatred, cruelty, lawlessness and monumental incompetence by trump's army of angry white militants. Even if someone IS here illegally, it is a misdemeanor, not a goddamned criminal felony offense!
I simply cannot list all the terrible things occurring in my country right now, not because I am not aware of them, but this is supposed to be my summation of another year, when I take stock of my life. I normally determine that it was a pretty damned good year, all things considered. Not so much this year. The USA I grew up in is gone. Oh, we are still a country but things have changed. Even once trump and his handlers are gone, the old USA is forever gone. We cannot go back. The young people will have to rebuild the country into whatever makes sense to them. There is the yawning abyss of a tragically uneducated population fed a constant soup of rage-baiting propaganda flowing from Fox News, Christian Nationalist FM radio stations, X, various podcasts, and a host of militant hate groups - to name a few.
Climate change is bearing down on our children and grandchildren like a horde of demons. The ugly failings of unrestrained Capitalism have produced the richest assholes in the history of the world and starved the American middle class almost out of existence, while creating an enormous working class of honest people living in poverty regardless of how hard or long they work. Add to this dismal picture the failing medical system, also being starved of money by insurance companies with fiduciary accountability to shareholders, not ill human beings.
When it comes time for me to shuffle off this mortal coil, I will take my failed responsibilities and the despair for my children's future with me, but it will do not one iota of good.
So... that's the bad news.
The good news is that I am still kicking, though getting old is for the goddamned birds! More often than not, I cannot open a jar, or even a carton of milk, because my hands are losing strength. I have to wrestle those jars like I am wrestling a baby alligator. Every year it seems the 'gator gets bigger and stronger.
I can still lift 50 pounds bags of horse feed, but I certainly cannot carry them very far. I can still take care of myself and the Supreme Beings and the wolf pack of German Shepherds. However, if you come to my house unexpectedly, you might catch the floors between vacuuming operations. I had NO IDEA that two German Shepherds shed enough hair every single day to cover a small home in drifts of black hair. They are not allowed on the furniture, so all of their hair is on the floor. I do not invite people to meals any more because I am terrified a black, two-inch long German Shepherd hair would make its way into the soup! I have only had this happen to me once, but it killed my appetite for several days. I would hate that to happen to someone eating at my table.
This year has been a steady stream of doctor office visits, tests, and the beginning of a list of medications and physical treatments. I have officially entered the realm of old age, I guess. Even so, I am still lucky. Nothing has progressed to a critical or debilitating stage. I will take my good fortune and be thankful.
I will be thankful for my little house here in the peace of the Kansas countryside. If I could magically transform my life, I would be living in a little cabin high on a cliff above the Pacific Ocean - northern California or Oregon, maybe. My bank account would be full of so much money that I could give money to family or friends any time they needed some. I would donate to environmental organizations that actively protect and support wildlife, wilderness places, and educate the rest of the world. I will thankfully accept my humble home here, and share my meager stash of treasure as I can, when I can, for as long as I can.
I will be grateful for another year with my beloved old horses, who patiently wait for me by the gate so we can all make the trip to the barn together in the mornings. I will always be happy to look out my window and see them quietly nodding in their frequent naps, or leisurely grazing, or standing near together, companions in their equine experience of this strange earth and mysterious life.
I will be grateful for my Mattie's gentle canine companionship. We just recently discovered we could communicate quite clearly. She will sit quietly, staring at me until I become aware of her. When I get up and say, "Show me." She will take a few steps toward the door, the food, the water, or most often, to the location of the bag of treats! She stops every few steps to look back, making sure I am still following. Then she will glance at whatever it is she wants. She doesn't ask for treats every day, and when she does get them, two tiny morsels, that is enough for her. Somehow, that breaks my heart - either for her trusting innocence that two is all she can expect, or my human frailty that makes two morsels never enough.
I pray for this world, for my country, for my friends and family, for myself. I give thanks for the sum of all of humanity's wisdom at my finger tips via Google, though I have to wade through a lot of dross to get to the goods. I fell asleep listening to Professor Brian Cox explain how black holes evaporate, that black holes are at the end of time, and how Albert Einstein intuited the Theory of Relativity by simply imagining. Of course, he was brilliant enough to produce the rigorous mathematics needed to prove it. But it was his imagination that led him to the holy grail.
What an amazing experience it is to live on this earth.
As is customary:
Peace of Earth and Good Will Toward (Some) Men.
from the Old Lady, the Supreme Beings, and the German Shepherds of Spirit Creek
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