All It Takes Is A Little Love

I have to admit that I have always been a worrier. I can’t exactly pinpoint to moment when I first feel prey to anxieties but I suspect that the origin or my concerns came when my favorite uncle died and I was suddenly sent to the first grade without so much as a warning. My memories before that time are of a happy go lucky soul with a kind of innocence that was unaware of the possibility of bad things happening to me or my family. For the first time in my life I began to consider negative possibilities that might rear their ugly heads to inflict pain and sorrow on my family. My innocence was somehow challenged in that fateful moment and the brave side of my personality was a bit more afraid than it had once been. 

With the help of a very loving family and lots of good friends I eventually got over the anxiety that followed my uncle’s death. He had been wise enough to warn me that he might not be able to overcome the cancer that kept returning to his body. He had done so in an honest and gentle way as though he understood how much I would need his reassurance that his fate was simply part of life. 

Just when things felt calm and reasonable again my father announced with hopeful glee that we were moving from our home in Texas to California. He was an adventurous soul who had lived in many different places when he was a child. He loved the idea of seeing new sights and accepting new challenges. I, on the other hand, was not so sure that I was ready to have my life upended once again. Nonetheless, as a child I had little say in the matter and so off we went to San Jose where I felt the same kind of unease that had enveloped me right after my uncle had died. Leaving the security of the school that I loved and the friends who meant so much to me was too much like suffering another grave loss. Still, I was determined to adjust to my new reality no matter how frightening it was for me. 

I was eight years old and the coming months would be some of the most tumultuous of my life. Not only was I miserable in San Jose but it seems that my father was as well. Before we even got settled he announced that he had quit his job and that we would head to Los Angeles where he had relatives that I had never met. They were going to help him find work in the bustling city where he believed there would be many opportunities. 

The very first day that we arrived at our temporary home the agent who had rented the place to my parents instructed us on what to do in the event of an earthquake. She was rather explicit about the dangers and so I had yet another thing to put in my bucket of worries. Ironically we ended up watching a movie that night with Spencer Tracy and Clark Gable that focused on the devastating disaster there early in the twentieth century. So I began to think deeply about what I would do if the earth began to shake beneath my feet.

School was better in Los Angeles and I found myself quickly making friends even though I was somewhat shy. We would visit the relatives who seemed to be delighted that we might put down roots and be near them for a long time, but they were older than my parents and certainly not as wonderful as my grandparents so I did not take to them the way I should have done. 

When my father was still unable to find work we were on the road again back to Texas where all of us would feel a bit more normal. Our first stop was in Corpus Christi where my father had gone to high school and became friends with my uncle who had died. Because my aunt lived nearby and we had visited her many times before. I was comforted by the move. School was great as well, but best of all my father would show me around the town that he so loved. Some afternoons he would take me and my brothers to the bay where he liked to fish. He talked about his enchantment with the ocean and would spin tales of his adventures with my uncle. I saw that he was happy again and it made me relax and enjoy those moments with him.

Even though I was only a child somehow I began to understand how much he too had been grieving over the loss of my uncle. The death of his best friend had haunted him and led him to a desire to delve into new adventures as a panacea. Realizing that my father was anxious too somehow calmed me down. I felt really good for the first time in a long time. 

Good luck was evasive for my father. He found no jobs in Corpus Christi but he was instead hired for a job back in Houston. At the very end of the school year we closed the circle of our adventure. Things were looking up and feeling normal once again. I was even seeing many of my old friends and enjoying Friday nights with my aunts and uncles and cousins. Then came the whammy that seemed to insure that I would always be a cautious worried soul. My father died in a car accident just as our family life was settling down into familiar patterns. 

I have learned how to tame my worries over time. Nonetheless there is always an element of anxiety lurking in the back of my mind. Experiences have taught me that challenges are an inevitable aspect of life. I tend to be ready for the next shoe to drop even as I sometimes grow wary when my world is going well. The history of my life has shown me that problems come along without warning and so I must always be ready to respond. 

My cautiousness has been both a positive and a negative in my life. I don’t allow my self to take too many chances but I also plan and double plan for the surprises that always seem to come. I have had to learn how to live in the happy moments without thinking too much about what might happen to change things. I suppose that like most humans I try to find balance as I walk on a tightrope with dangers lurking beneath my feet. All in all I have found ways to savor the joys of life with gusto but also be ready for anything. I tend to live one moment at a time because I have learned that changes come without warning. Rather that constantly worrying I focus on taking one step at a time in the journey of life. One thing that I know for certain is that I always find ways to adapt and friends to help me through any trials that come along. 

The little voice that warns me to be careful is mostly quiet but always there. I suppose that such is the fate of every person who has ever lived. I now know that my story has not defined me but has made me more aware of the need to embrace joy whenever it comes into my life. My fears have actually made me strong and so much more loving. Life does not determine who we are but it does have an impanct on how we react. What a gift my story has been!

I attended the No Kings protest on March 28, 2026. It was my fourth time to join others in such a rally to make our voices heard as we witness Donald Trump overlooking the rules that are clearly stated in the Constitution. I have been happy to be able to continue to assert my first amendment rights and to be with people who are willing to use those rights to make our concerns public. 

I went twice to downtown Houston, Texas and marched in the streets of the city. I was impressed with how peaceful and kind all of the people there were. Some came with coolers filled with water to share with anyone who became hot or dehydrated. Others brought flowers that they gave randomly to people in the crowd or to the police officers who were making sure that we were going to be safe and not become the victims of someone hoping to do us harm. I very much enjoyed the feeling that we were not that much different than some of my ancestors of long ago who decided to join the American Revolution of two hundred fifty years ago. 

Later I found out that there were also No Kings protests closer to my home. Given that my father-in-law’s health has been fading and my knees have been giving me lots of trouble I chose to see was it was like at the rally in Pearland, Texas on my third go around. Given that Pearland is a notoriously red town I did not expect to find the crowd of seven hundred kindred spirits who were there. It was uplifting to know that I was not alone in my anxieties about the present state of our union.

I had a total knee replacement only weeks ago. I am still in physical therapy and it will be many weeks before I will be totally healed. Even though I wanted to be part of the march in downtown Houston I knew that my artificial knee was not yet up to the task of walking many blocks on hard concrete in the midst of a crowd of thousands. So I decided to return to the lovely park where the folks in Pearland would be gathering. With a sturdy chair, a wide brimmed hat and plenty of water I set out with my husband to sit and listen to the local speakers who laid out their reasons for being there. 

It was a great experience. Once again everyone was polite and helpful and eager to voice their concerns about the present state of our government. Most of those who spoke were stunning and it made me feel great to be in their presence. I listened raptly for two hours and felt more and more certain that the American people are genuinely good individuals who want what is best for everyone, not just a select few.

It was with a great deal of hopefulness that I posted photos of my No Kings adventure on Facebook. Over fifty of my friends many of whom had been colleagues and former students showed their support for what I had done, but one soul challenged me to explain why I felt the need to protest anything about our current president. He then listed all of the things that he believes make the president great, not someone to be criticized. 

I did not want to turn my joy into a debate that I already suspected would not change anyone’s mind, especially the man who disagreed with me. I have known him for a very long time and I understand his political views even though I disagree with most of them. I realized that if I had taken the bait it would not have made a difference and then some of my protective friends might have thrown themselves into the fray. I did not choose to ruin the happiness that I was feeling so I simply deleted his comment without response.

Now I am ready to defend my views which I have done many times with my blogs. The truth is that I don’t really know where or how to begin because I truly believe that Donald Trump is indeed the worst president that our nation has ever had. He is the nightmare of those among the Founding Fathers who tried so hard to set up a system of three separate branches of government that would keep any one group from operating alone. Sadly at the moment that system is not working the way it was meant to be. 

So here are the bullet points for why I was at a No Kings protest:

• First of all I believe that Donald Trump should have been impeached after January 6, 2021 when he lied to his supporters that the election was rigged and then goaded them to go to Congress to stop the transfer of power. 
• Then of course there are the many crimes of which Trump has been accused and sometimes even found guilty of perpetrating including sexually attacking women, unlawfully keeping documents and then impeding the process of reclaiming them, and being far too close to Jeffry Epstein to believe that he is totally innocent.
• The economy of the United States was the best in the world when Trump came back into office. Since then he has illegally placed outrageous tariffs on other countries that have resulted in higher prices on virtually everything we purchase and has negatively affected the worldwide economy.
• Trump’s overly aggressive immigration policies have not resulted in an effective process of finding and deporting illegals who have been engaged in criminal activities in spite of his boasting that he is making us less dangerous by taking such people off of the streets. In fact, President Obama has a much better track record of finding and deporting the most egregious illegals while Trump’s ICE goons are untrained and dangerous.
• The methods of ICE are uncalled for and have resulted in innocents being sent to detention centers and deaths that need not have happened. They operate like a secret police more than a force for law and order.
• Without consultation with CongressTrump has committed our country to war against Iran without thought of how to end the hostilities.
• Trump has insulted our allies and boasted that he is going to take Greenland and rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. He has undone decades of diplomacy and shown our allies that our country can no longer be trusted. At the same time he has cozied up to Putin and other authoritarian leaders.
• Trump has created a cabinet of nonsensical people who only know how to flatter him but are not up to the task of running the FBI, the Defense Department, the Department of Justice, the CIA, the Department of Health and Human Services or the Department of Homeland Security. 
• Presently Trump is doing everything possible to pass a law that would make it difficult for millions of people to vote just to insure that Republicans never again lose an election.
• Trump has done his best to turn us against immigrants, people of color, women, and members of the LGBTQ community, most especially the tiny number of trans people who exist in our nation. His cruelty is stunning.
• Trump pretends to be a religious man but shows no signs whatever that he is a man of faith in anyone but himself. 
• Trump lies as he breathes and seems only concerned about enriching himself and his family.
• Trump shows signs of an elderly man whose mind is dwindling and should not be charged with making important decisions. At the very least he is the most ignorant president we have ever had to endure.

I could go on and on and on but we all know that everything costs more than it did before Trump came into office. The effect of his policies have generally been to create so many problems that it will be decades before we will be able to restore our faith in the nation and our standing in the world. So, yes, I went to a protest and I will keep doing so because I love the United States and its people. I went because I want goodness and fairness for all Americans, not just those who are white and Christian. I went for all of the many people who have depended on the United States to be a safe and fair place. I will not remain silent hoping that all the damage just goes away. I do not believe that any of us should be complacent. So I will keep marching or sitting until there is positive change. 

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it…always.”

Mahatma Gandhi

I had not been to my favorite nail salon for almost three months. I had to stop many weeks prior to having a total knee replacement and I was told not to do such things for even more weeks after the surgery. I missed the pampering that I receive when I am there and most of all the sweet manicurist who always makes me feel so special. She and I talk about family and dreams and the kind of things that women understand. So when It was finally okay for me to return I truly looked forward to spending time with a person that I greatly respect and have grown to think of as a friend. 

I have to admit that I was somewhat shocked to see that I was the only person present in the usually bustling business. My manicurist, Kim, greeted me with a big smile and began showering me with questions about how my surgery had been and how I was feeling. Once we had caught up on news about our respective family members the topic of the state of the nation quietly came to the forefront of our conversation. 

Kim pointed out the obvious lack of customers on a day that might otherwise have been busy. She felt that it was related to the rising costs of groceries and gasoline. After all luxuriating in a salon is something that can rather easily be written out of a budget when finances get stretched. As she mentioned that even people in other countries were feeling the economic pinch of these times I silently counted myself fortunate to be able to be a bit frivolous with the funds that I get from homeschooling and tutoring. I began to wonder how many people were not just struggling but anxious about the security of their jobs. I worried about Kim and what would happen to her and her family if the lack of customers caused the salon to close. I viscerally felt the backlash of our shaky economy in a way that had not occurred to me during my cloistered time related to my knee surgery. 

I began to occur to me that it was not my imagination that stores seemed to have fewer people inside of late. I wondered if this was also related to fears causing people to cut back on their purchases. With inflation caused by tariffs and higher prices caused by a surprise war with Iran there is an uncertainty hovering over the world unlike I have seen in so many years. 

I grew up in a single parent home. My mother always seemed to find ways to keep us housed and well fed but there were times when I wondered if she was privy to some kind of magic. I knew how small her income was and found it rather amazing that she was able to hold things together with so little. To this day I think that she should have written a book on how to manage a household with a bit of imagination. She knew how to keep us well fed with her culinary magic that took a pot roast through many iterations during the course of a week. 

Now my brothers and I live like royalty thanks to our mother’s ability to keep us safe while we navigated toward our life’s work. We were part of a fortunate generation that had so many opportunities that no longer exist for our young people today. We old folks like to brag about our humble beginnings but the truth is that we were able to purchase gasoline for twenty five cents a gallon or less. Our first cars cost a few thousand dollars. We were able to purchase homes for twenty thousand dollars and even though our salaries may have been proportionally small we had good health benefits and sometimes even pension plans that would sustain us in our old age. 

Sadly our president thinks that he has every right to decide whether or not to levy tariffs and when and where he can declare war. Instead of Congress rationally discussing such issues the majority Republicans seem to be content to do nothing to stop him and then to defeat any attempts by the Democrats to curb his enthusiasm for reshaping the world to his own desires. Thus prices are high and ordinary citizens are struggling and wondering what happened to the promises of better days with Trump at the helm. People are truly worried just as Kim pointed out and I continue to be concerned as well.

I plan to take part in the No Kings protest tomorrow. It will be my fourth time to do so since Trump became our president. With each passing week I have found more and more reasons to liken him to an authoritarian king who decorates his office with gold and remains ignorant of the suffering of so many of the people. I urge everyone to find a way to use their voices and their influence to let Trump and the Republican party know that his flaunting of the Constitution and our democratic principles is not sustainable. Make your concerns known. Your silence insures that nothing will be done to set things right. Find the issue that bothers you the most and then use the power that the First Amendment gave all American citizens. Use that freedom of speech. Join us as we peacefully let it be known that this is not the beloved country we have known. Let Republicans know that we expect them to assert themselves and stop bowing to the outrageous demands of a president overstepping his powers. The whole world needs us to help set things right. As Gandhi reminds us the tyranny will ultimately fail. It always does and we should all be on the right side of truth and freedom when it happens.

I won’t name names but I will never forget the time when a new student came to my school and wreaked havoc for many years after. Because teachers often relied on alphabetical seating I found myself in close proximity to him over and over again. Somehow we always ended up in the same class and almost always I seemed to be chosen to endure his bad behavior because I was a quiet child who had been counseled by my parents to respect the teachers and my fellow students. My mother had also cautioned me to ignore any taunts from my classmates as a sign of immaturity or perhaps a lack of guidance at home. Thus I learned how to tune out the insults and attempts at bullying me that the egregious kid seemed to find joy in producing.  

Through the years of putting up with him I had grown weary of being the better person when this boy set forth on one of his many attempts to raise my ire. I suppose that his abuse had finally gotten to me so I hatched a plan in my mind to gig him into behaving so badly that maybe he might finally be sent away. I waited for a moment to outfox him and my patience finally paid off. 

It was an ordinary day and the kid was up to his usual high jinx when the teacher very professionally and politely asked him to stand up to read a paragraph in our history book. He was actually a good reader with a booming voice that made him a wise choice for public recitations. For some reason, however, he decided that he preferred not to follow her command even though he usually enjoyed the limelight of being chosen to read in spite of his other offensive foibles. On this day he sat defiantly in his chair and dared her with his stare to push him too far.

I suppose that the teacher was as weary of his recalcitrance as I was because instead of selecting someone else to read she drew a line in the stand. She insisted that he do as he had been told. That is when I saw my opportunity to push him to a point of no return. Because I sat right behind him, I leaned forward and whispered that he did not need to comply. After hesitating for a moment he boldly told the teacher that he was tired and that he did not want to read. He further taunted her by saying that she had no right to force him to do anything. 

As the enraged teacher began walking toward the boy’s desk I prodded him one more time by whispering that he was well within in his rights. Somehow he was emboldened to plant his feet in total defiance and when the teacher was finally standing over him he made the huge mistake of cursing with words that shocked us all. 

Everything escalated from there. The next thing I knew he had lost it so much that he came out of his chair with his fist clenched as though he was ready to hit the teacher. At that point I really worried about what I had done and wondered if the whole situation was getting more out of hand than I had imagined. The teacher stopped him cold when she ordered one of my classmates to run to the office to get the principal. Upon hearing those words the boy collapsed back into his chair crying like a baby and begging for forgiveness from the teacher. 

We all sat in a kind of stunned silence as we awaited the conclusion of this horrific situation. The only sound was that of the sobbing boy who at that point realized that he had gone too far. When the principal arrived he meekly followed her out of the classroom and then our teacher continued the lesson as though nothing had happened. 

I suddenly felt guilty for what I had done and yet when the bully who had tortured so many kids for so long never returned I felt a bit like a heroine who would never be able to admit my part in the terrible ending of his time at our school. Instead the lesson that I learned was that those who bully us are usually more fragile than we are. They use force and insults to control us but in reality that are very weak. 

I would lie if I said that I felt sorrow for that kid. Over many years he had insulted authority and done his best to find vulnerable classmates to torment. I never understood how he had lasted so long without dire consequences for his behavior and yet it bothered me that I had purposely pushed him to be defiant. 

I’ve thought about that awful boy so many times over the years. I wonder what eventually happened to him. I would like to think that he outgrew his domineering ways but part of me worries that he only continued his hatefulness. His was not a matter of immaturity but a seemingly determined way to feel better about himself by asserting his power over others.  On the other hand maybe just maybe he learned something that day and went on to mature and treat others with respect and kindness. I suppose I will never know. 

Even as a teacher whenever I encountered such broken students I found it difficult to understand what horrific things made them the way that they were. I saw that some of them wanted to be different but literally did not know how to be so. I heard from parents who were afraid of their own children. I listened to stories about some of these bullies that were frightening. Somehow either by dent of some terrible mental illness or lack of guidance the existence of such souls was a constant challenge that happened over and over again. Once in a great while I was actually successful in helping to turn these kinds of children around but most of the time their difficulties were too ingrained to change. 

Now we have a man in the White House who showed signs of such ugliness when he was a boy. He taunted his classmates and his siblings but nobody really stopped him. They simply pushed him from one place to another as he lied and cheated and bullied his way through life. They flattered him by implying that he was somehow better and stronger than others to keep him at bay. They created a monster who is terrorizing the world. At this point it’s time for all of us to call him out, not with guile but with courage and honor. He is too old to change but not too old to be held accountable for all the chaos he has created.  As a child he was just an annoyance. As the leader of one of the most powerful countries on earth he is a danger to us all.

Before my father died he read poems and stories to me on a regular basis. He spent his evenings at home reading for hours. On weekends he took me to bookstores where he always added one more volume to his growing literary collection. On vacation trips he stopped at bookstores whenever he saw one. I cut my teeth on books so it is no accident that reading them has been central to my entire life. 

I remember when I got my first library card. It was an exciting moment given that I was able to check out more than one tome at a time. Even though I would have been able to keep the books for two weeks I tended to devour my choices almost immediately so that I would be able to return for more in only a week. 

One of my fondest memories is riding my bicycle across a bridge that linked my neighborhood with Garden Villas where a bookmobile showed up once a week. The librarian and I became good friends mostly because there weren’t that many people who visited as regularly as I did. Once I had gone through many of the titles in the gigantic van the sweet lady who brought me so much joy would ask me what I would like see the next time I came. It was so much like owning a treasured and unlimited number of books without having to pay for them. 

I can still see the tiny library on wheels and the woman who brought a world of knowledge to my backdoor. It was quiet and cool inside even on the hottest days of summer. She was iconic to me with her glasses and the graying hair the she wore in a bun. It seemed to please her that I was so excited about reading. 

I was also able to check out books at my school library and it was there that I also met a wonderful woman who catered to my excitement about discovering new authors and genres that kept me feeling adventurous. Eventually she moved from the elementary school to the high school that I attended. When I saw her there I knew that I was going to enjoy the four years of my last youthful moments.

A library card is as good as a ticket to an exotic place. I had a passport to knowledge that I otherwise would not have discovered. Even though my physical world was still quite limited, the world of my mind was constantly expanding. My reading became especially enjoyable when my high school English teacher provided us with lists of some of the best books ever written. I became addicted to poetry, fiction and nonfiction from classical to modern day authors. 

I still prefer the feel of an old time book over the concept of finding new stories online. There is something spiritual about holding a volume in my hands and wondering who else had found wisdom and happiness in turning the pages in search of new ideas. 

I have followed in my father’s footsteps. If I see a bookstore on my travels I must enter and usually walk out with a new volume to store in my home. Once in a blue moon I cull my stock of reading, but it is always difficult to say goodbye to a book that kept me entertained or privy to learning that I had never before occurred to me. If I am ever to be accused of being a hoarder it will be because of my books. 

To this very day I find comfort just in being around books. I enjoy talking about them with others and comparing my impressions with theirs. I get excited about learning something that I never knew before. I gobble up historical tracts that tell the stories of people who have come before me. I like encountering new words and ideas. I am open to almost every kind of genre as long as the writing advances me to new places and points of view. I am so enamored of reading that I find it strange that some people never take the time to pick up a newspaper or magazine or a modern or classic book. How can we have so much knowledge at our fingertips and not be eager to embrace it?

One of my favorite Twilight Zone episodes is the story of a man who enjoyed reading as much as I do. Suddenly there was destruction of most of the world and its people but he was content because all he really needed was a continuous stock of books to keep him company. Sadly in an unexpected accident his spectacles were ruined. The story ended with him sobbing because he was no longer able to see. There he was surrounded by a library worthy of Alexandria with no way of making the lines and markings on the page clear enough to focus his eyes. He was doomed to be alone for the rest of his life. No more would the books keep him company as he had hoped. Somehow I viscerally felt his pain.

Those of us who have known the pure joy of reading a good book cannot imagine a time in which we would no longer be able to read. Losing our citizenship in the world of knowledge that books provide would be an unbearable devastation. Thank goodness the resources that I crave are all still available. I plan to keep reading and learning hopefully for all of my days.