Insistence

On top of weeks and weeks and months, heck over a thousand days since the November election that threw democracy into full existential crisis (that only grows graver, seemingly by the news cycle), this week felt surreal. Two mass shootings possibly pushed our national conversation into new territory as the good people of Ohio chanted spontaneously at their governor these two words: “Do something.” Maybe the conversation moved because we are talking about the threat of domestic terrorism by white extremists. Walmart took away video games and kept guns, so. We didn’t change overnight or necessarily over time. But maybe we did.

Then again, just after the worst attack on Latino people by a person with a gun, who was white, ICE carried out its biggest raids on brown people, literally leaving children stranded without parents. A gym owner opened the space for children and people brought food. What the actual fuck.

And the Facebook ads from the GOP for reelection of a so-called leader who only stokes fear and hatred won’t stop with the word “invasion” because, well, because. Hatred sells.

**

It was a gloriously beautiful August day. In the morning, my daughter said that it seemed like having something terrible happen on such a beautiful day would be strange. Of course, I flashed to 9–11, a date she’s too young to remember by far, a date she hasn’t reckoned with yet, and I vaguely mentioned it but got fuzzy on specifics as I didn’t want to ruin her day. Arguably, for other children in Mississippi or an infant in El Paso, the worst day happened this week. I think what I’m saying is that the longer this drags on, the harder I find it to hold the good. I am grieving losses that aren’t technically mine, but I believe they are all of ours at once even though they aren’t physically touching all of us. Today, I was flooded by sadness and anger and hopelessness and I was flooded by blue sky and a slight, fresh breeze. Today, I was steeped in friendship and good ideas and my daughter’s buoyancy and my son’s smile, and the satisfaction of getting some words right.

I thought about how language is important and maybe my small act for the day should be to point out to a major newspaper that White Nationalism is a preferred term to racist extremists and a word like “racist” or “terrorist” is more apt. While we’re at it, “manifesto” implies logic while “rant” is also more apt, given the contest of our times. “To the Editor” are three words I’ve been writing often.

I try to stick with the sky, but my heart sinks to the weeds. The sky has no time for my weeds, thank goodness.