Hey all,
As I was thinking about what to write this week, it struck me that I am living in two very different worlds simultaneously. Bizzaro World and Normalandia.
In Normalandia, life proceeds as usual. I wake up each morning, get some writing done, and get to work. Mark and I have breakfast together, work some more, and play a card game at lunch. In the evening, we binge-watch some shows on our Roku box, and then get to bed around ten o’clock.
In Normalandia, the sun shines brightly outside, the sprinklers come one at 5 AM, the mailman brings our mail around 11, and our friend, landlady, and neighbor pounds on our back door when she has some leftovers to bring us or wants to talk.
But I can’t help but keep an eye on the other, darker half of the world – Bizzaro World. I check CNN.com continuously throughout the day, keeping an eye on our orange monster and his latest rantings and ravings. Though he is distant, I can’t help but feel the clutch of fear in my gut that his big paws could come grasping for me at any moment. That the whirlwind of discord that he sows could wipe away Normalandia in an instant.
In the Bizzaro World, our own press and government is our enemy. The Europeans are evil thugs plotting to take away from us all that is good and right and sanctimonious.
In the Bizzaro World, up is down and left is bad.
In the Bizzaro World, things are inching ever closer to Fascism.
Sometimes I want to lock out Bizzaro World completely – shut the blinds, close the browser, turn off all the news alerts.
More often, I sit in my chair and stare at the screen blankly, wondering how we got here. How my world was split in two, and how it can ever be put back together again.
Mark and I went to church on Sunday, and one of the Pastor’s messages was this:
“Be joyful, even when you have considered all the facts.”
I think that’s the reason we cling so tightly to Normalandia. We know instinctively that have to find moments of peace and calm and love amidst the whirlwind.
But I would amend that message to this:
“Be joyful, even when you know all the facts. But keep fighting, because you do.”
I have to believe all is not lost. That there is a bridge too far, even for the 40% who adore the orange monster. That elections still matter.
I believe that we are stronger together. That once again Normalandia can re-assert itself in our lives. That the Bizzaro World will be rejected by those to whom truth and love still matter.
I have started a campaign I’m calling #writeforourlives. The immediate focus is to try to delay or block Judge Kavanagh’s nomination to the Supreme Court.
But the longer term goal is to find our voice again as liberals, as progressives, and as decent human beings.
I invite you to join me, by writing a handwritten letter and sending it to the swing votes in the Senate, to your own representatives, to your local papers. Make your voices heard. Do it daily until it starts to make a difference.
Will you stand with me?
#writeforourlives