I’m a tough old bird. I’ve been through many tragedies and horrors in my lifetime and managed to overcome each challenge. My mother taught me to be optimistic and grateful even in the most difficult times. I’ve come close to breaking, but I’ve always managed to stiffen my back, regain my energy and composure and plow on. I’ve worked hard my entire life. I had my first babysitting job at the age of ten and by the time I was fifteen I was working as a summer clerical replacement in a medical clinic. I’ve dissolved in tears inside the privacy of my home over tragedies that seemed too much and always found the resolve to keep moving forward. It’s what we are all called upon to do when times get tough. 

I am now seventy six years old and my knees hurt most of the time. The curvature of my spine from scoliosis sends shooting pains down my legs. I’ve learned how to grit my teeth and keep pushing forward in spite of no longer being the most robust version of myself. It is the way I have always been. I refuse to give up. There is still too much to do, too many people who need my care. Nevertheless there are times when I feel so weary that I wonder if it is indeed time to scale back and let someone else take on the world. Of late that feeling overcomes me more and more often, not so much because of physical ills, but because of what I witness happening in the world around me. I wonder why nothing that I attempt to do to change things seems to make even an iota of difference. I long for a win but only see the ugliness and cruelty increasing and so I have another big cry in the privacy of my bedroom and pull up my boot straps once again. 

So what sends me falling into a feeling of desperation? It is the reality of seeing masked men arresting people in workplaces, at Home Depots, at school functions, in grocery store parking lots. I see the cages prepared for them on an island in the everglades. I hear our president joking about the snakes and alligators that might chase them. I see that a seventy five year old man who has lived in the USA for sixty years has died while in custody. I read that families are being torn apart. I watch our president hinting that birth right citizenship should not be legal and our Supreme Court refusing to take a stand against his horrific testing our our Constitution. 

I am a gentle soul with a tough skin. I tend not to be afraid. I had to become strong willed long ago just to survive. I have spent my life advocating for people who did not know how to speak up for themselves. I have counted on the goodness of people and our nation to help them but in the present moment it feels as though a considerable number of citizens no longer care about the sick and poor among us. I know that our system has always been imperfect but we appeared to be trying to feed and educate all children, not just those whose parents had the funds to do so. We devised programs to care for the old and the indigent. I paid my taxes knowing that I was doing my part to provide the most basic human needs for everyone. I liked to think that it was a duty, a moral imperative but now I see greed being touted and billionaires getting ridiculous tax cuts.

I know what I see and hear and cannot imagine that more Americans are not as furious as I am. How could we have voted for monsters who seem to place so little value on all human lives? Why isn’t everyone demanding that the destruction of our nation stop today, not two years from now in a midterm election? Do my fellow citizens not realize how much damage will be done in the months ahead? Do they not see what I see? Why do I feel as though I am screaming but few people are hearing me? Why do I sense that fear has overtaken our land and people are one by one resigning themselves to the horror of it all?

So today I have hit a wall. My nose is figuratively bloodied. My mind is in a deep dark place. I have been here before when my mother was raging with her bipolar disorder. I have had to fight off the inclination to give up multiple times when my husband seemed to be on the verge of leaving this earth. There has always been the light of good people urging me forward and there still is, but morality and love need a very big win right now and I fear that it will not come.

Pundits are predicting that it will take a bleak time in our history before we pull out of our present situation. I honestly hope that they are wrong but my instincts tell me that we are in this mess for a very long haul. Perhaps I will have to rest now and then because my body and my mind are not as inclined to work for long stretches as they once were. I’ll have to find ways to briefly pause to get some respite from the madness swirling around me, but I promise that I will never stop protesting evil and greed when I see it. I will not grow silent until our country is once again being led my someone who is humane and willing to consider the needs of all citizens, not just those who voted for him or her. 

I am sick at heart. I hate the daily ruckuses, the threats, the demolition of our most treasured institutions. I know I am not alone. I hear the voices telling me to stay strong. I’ll get over my morose mood and join the fight again. There is too much to lose if I surrender to complacency. This horrific time won’t pass without the determination of a vast swath of people who love this country and refuse to see it destroyed. I am but one person but together with the good people of this nation the wrongs will be righted again.

God bless the United States of America on this day when we remember the brave souls who fought for the ideals that we must all preserve. God give us the strength to do what is right for all people, not just ourselves.