Draft #3... My Self Imposed Facebook Exile; Giving Thanks; etc.

Photo of bumper sticker that i have on my refrigerator 

I have started three drafts now in as many days and decided i cannot do this without a glass of wine. I have a harder time thinking about what to write with coffee than i do wine.

This draft might make it. Let me put some music on too.......Ok, that's better i'm streaming David Grohl's You Tube acoustic playing. Right now it's Learning to Fly. (David Grohl has to be the coolest guy on the planet. Seriously, can you think of a cooler guy?)

Let me just go ahead and number this and let her rip:

1. It has been two weeks today since The Last Election Before the Apocalypse. I deactivated my Facebook account over a week ago with the idea i would return after a week, but i am actually not missing it too much just yet. I may wait another week.

2. Because i have friended lots of union folks from my old job and many educators,  therefore my newsfeed pretty much exploded with the election. It's nice to have like-minded friends but they kept feeding Facebook with stories that were getting me all upset again (when he started picking his team)....JUST as i was calming down. (The shared stories were also getting redundant.) So i figured a break would be a good thing. But i'll be back. I miss too many people who don't email or blog anymore. (Plus I don't forget that FB has served me well by giving me a home base where my friends are able to educate me about many things, such as my trip to Italy.)

3. But yeah, i do sort of want to blame FB for paving the way for the fake news shit that was bandied about. People are getting worse and worse about not caring about facts and don't read beyond the headline. We have become a culture of getting our news from memes and tweets.  (pearl if you are reading i loved that article you put up that made that point ... it had a headline (paraphrasing) Bernie Sanders Can Be President Through a Little Known Loophole.

What's been making me feel a little better these days? I am wearing my Obama t-shirts since i can't wear my Hillary one that i just bought, (though i still have her bumper sticker on my front door).

4. One meme i did like was the one that said (and again I am paraphrasing) ...  "Forget about putting the Christ back in Christmas. Let's put Christ back in CHRISTIAN! "  A lot of folks who call themselves Christian supported Trump for reasons other than just normally voting a Republican ticket - i am talking about he ones that came out of their scurvy hidey hole to vote because they ARE racist. Jesus would NEVER EVER have voted for Trump. (Not saying he would vote for Hillary either, but i know He wouldn't vote for Trump and i'm not all that Christian but that is a faith i do have.)

What i can't wrap my head around is that more white WOMEN voted for Trump than Hillary. What the fucking fuck? 

5. The BEST meme about the election, in my opinion is,  (again I am paraphrasing since i can't check on FB to see).... "Not all Trump supporters are racist and misogynists, but what you are saying when you vote for him is that it's not a deal breaker."

6. This got me thinking about deal breakers if i were dating again. (This could be a whole blog separate blog post!) I am going to say my deal breakers are:

• doing drugs (not including pot, but they can't smoke it often if they do)
• smoking
• being right wing or voting for Trump
• being a born again Christian type who is always preaching about Jesus 
• not having a source of income or a retirement future
• not appreciating good music or books

7. Thankfully my husband fits this ticket!

My nephew took this photo of Brady last week. I love it so much! I had to Photoshop out my niece Kendall  because her face was hidden. But it makes a better photo. with just Brady. 

8. Now for my Thanksgiving Stuff:  

I've said it before: I am thankful for all of my nieces and nephews in my life and THEIR kids who have made it so easy for me to be childless and not regretful of my choice. (Brady's 4 month old sister Lauren is such a happy laughing baby like Brady was, she's cute with red hair too but when she gets a wee bit cuter i will put up a photo. ) I thought it would be so difficult babysitting two at a time, but so far the last three times have been great! 

9. I am thankful that we live in a country where we can protest the outcome of an election. I just wish those fucking anarchists would go back to their hovel. No one who didn't vote should be allowed to protest. I would make that rule ... hahaha.

10. I am thankful that we live in the Pacific Northwest! Where the weather is fairly mild and my politics match. I even like the rain. It goes along with my homebody personality.

11. I am thankful that we get to rent our friend Rita Cressman's new place on Vashon for four days starting Christmas day. It has a full 180 degree view of the Puget Sound, Mt. Rainier and the ferry going back and forth 12 times a day. What a great way to top off the holiday! 

12. I am thankful once again for a year where everyone i love and care about, family and friends, are alive and doing well, with the exception of Brian's mom who i am worried about. We just moved her in assisted living and right now she is in a nursing home in rehab because she fell only after being there for three days. It's been hard on the family watching her go downhill. She's a sweet amazing lady and i will miss her more than my own mom when she is not around. 

I could go on, but i gotta go pack for our trip over the mountain pass to Brian's sister's house for Thanksgiving tomorrow morning. It's a five hour drive which i ALWAYS hate. I might bring my leftover Xanax! hahaha. 

13. I am thankful for Xanax!  I wish it was a vitamin! I only take it when i'm traveling on an airplane. It almost makes me want to take MORE trips!...just for the Xanax Experience.

Happy Thanksgiving all!  Thanks for reading. 

The Walking Numb & No GPS Coordinate for the High Road

It is still hard for me to believe that our country elected Donald Trump. How did we elect a candidate that the KKK endorsed? And you don't need me to list all the rest of the deplorable things he has done because we know them too well and are not likely to forget even if you are reading this blog 4 years from now. (OH! I do like that word 'deplorable').

I have read many articles linked on Facebook that try to give reasons for this and i do believe there is blame to go around everywhere, including with the Democrats. But most of all is the astonishing fact that so many people did not vote.

I am not subscribing to the 'love trumps hate' and l'et's all try to get along and be nice'. Now we are asked to support our President (SHIT, their side in the Senate and House never tried to do that why are we supposed to?) He's bringing in some horrible people, starting with those sons of his who look like serial killers who be starring in American Psycho instead of Christian Bale. Nice doesn't ever seem to get us anywhere. Trump tapped into the anger in this country, and to a different degree, so did Bernie Sanders. Hillary was always so careful and measured. But as a woman she wouldn't be able to get away with it in the same way. Look what happens when Elizabeth Warren gets fierce. I feel like we need to get tougher.  Fierce. Feisty. Taking no shit. Standing up for what is right and not trying to have it all ways to seemingly please everyone. I did not support Bernie Sanders as the nominee though i did like him. (I had trouble with his pie in the sky ideas, especially about free college tuition for all.) But i had wished Bernie Sanders was chosen as her running mate instead of Tim Kaine.

I do sort of get why people get pissed off at liberals and the elite label that comes with being liberal. Too often we are so busy trying to be the smartest person in the room. Correcting people, going off on extreme environmental issues, making fun of Walmart and its shoppers, etc. etc. I am guilty too. (Though i have NEVER been the smartest person in the room unless I am babysitting.)

Political correctness does go too far. I think i wrote here somewhere about the Pacific Lutheran University billboards "Words Can Hurt". from a few years ago  I liked them at first: 'ghetto', 'homo', 'illegal'. But then came 'exotic' and 'what are you?' and that gave me pause. Maybe i need to ask my niece Jessica who is part black and how this makes her feel.  Is it really so bad to want to know the heritage of someone you know or just met? Jessica could pass for Native American and Hispanic. And she does look 'exotic'. (Which i always thought was a nice word. ) People get jumped on often for the slightest words, when they mean no malice. And then what was okay before is no longer okay today.  So yeah, maybe the folks who can't stand this about we liberals are fed up and want us to shut up. And they shut us up didn't they? By voting.

I also believe Van Jones was correct about the 'white-lash'....that the vote for Trump is a backlash for Black Lives Matter movement and the misunderstanding of what that was. And of course, it's about the Supreme Court.

And certainly that FBI fucker didn't help. And Hillary made the mistake Kerry did when he was Swiftboated. She should have come out swinging. While i admire her ability to keep it together there is a part of me that wanted to see a glimpse of the real Hillary behind the scenes.

Facebook hurt too. Folks are so quick to vote by headlines and memes and believe the outright lies that are a part of them. (I think it was Bill Maher that said Americans will spend more time researching on Yelp on where to find the perfect taco than they do voting their ballot. )

I am sad. I am as sad as anyone. But i have to say this too: I am tired already of the handwringing, obsession and crying (sobbing even!) about the outcome. Right now i don't even want to read more horrible news about what Trump is going to do or not do. (I don't need one more reason to be afraid or sad! )

I was very lazy with this election, (the laziest since before Al Gore). But we live in a blue state and i our state did indeed vote that way without my help as i expected they would. And i am so burned out on local politics because it was a huge part of my job and when i retired i wanted to be retired from some of that stuff i used to have to do.

But there are many folks who spend hours and hours who have been pissed off all year long, posting about how horrible Trump is. And many live in states that are not blue, where maybe they could have made a difference if they got off their ass off Facebook and showed up to Hillary headquarters. I don't know what to do except right now write a check to NARAL and Planned Parenthood, which i did this morning.

I have no answers or ideas on how to bridge the divide between us. I am afraid of what a Trump presidency is going to do because Making America Great Again is a scary mission statement. Keeping America Great i can subscribe to. But that word 'Again" i fear is about taking us back in time where it sucked for so many, except for white men. In the past years we have made such great strides in being more inclusive of more Americans who were so discriminated against. What happens now?