…put into practice what I said to myself I would. That when all this comes to pass, which it inevitably will, I’ll do that thing that needs to be done with the people I love as well as the noisy crowds full of people I know nothing about. Maybe it’s as simple as I intend to live this year. But it’s not like I didn’t live in the last one. Again, life will be different. Suddenly a jarring new place we’ll all find ourselves in. Sitting across from someone for seemingly the first time ever without the fear of losing our health in the weeks following. Looking a person who is new in the eyes. Doesn’t matter how long I’ve known the person, it will all be new regardless. Eye to eye, beating hearts close at hand. In the presence of unpredictability and excitement, and perhaps disappointment and boredom. Either way, I intend to find out.
In 2020, I liked...
…being pushed to reassess. Having to go into uncharted waters knowing everyone else was having to do the exact same thing. This was all new and we were all having to do our best to figure it out. Doing our best was the order of the day and, for the most part, everyone was doing just that. We were tasked to live through this and we did our best to make it. To survive. To continue on. It was all a big deal. Maybe for once in our lives we were finally able to speak life and death collectively and it not be hyperbole. Where do we go next in all of this? Nowhere too far I hope. I didn’t feel like I was missing out on not going anywhere at all last year. Instead the present beckoned. And I tried to do my best to answer its call.
Oppose any and all attacks on our voting process
From the Nebraska Democratic Party:
The Republicans have launched an attack on our voting process in our state at the Unicameral. As reported by the Omaha World-Herald, state Sen. Julie Slama has introduced bills requiring voters to show ID in order to cast a ballot and another measure to change the way Nebraska allocates its five Electoral College votes — which helped President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris win the White House.
The Salvation of the State is Watchfulness in the Citizen
This is chiseled in the stone of our state capital in Lincoln. Powerful words, they’ve stuck with me since I first saw them so many years ago. Especially when neo-Nazis held a rally on the capital steps in the early 2000s. And now when the Republican party has openly embraced American style fascism, an uptick from their denigration of the citizen through a constant hobbling of our government institutions.
I don’t take kindly to people who wreck what we’re supposed to be building together.
Stay watchful.
The America Years
I’m a straight white man of privilege from very modest upbringings who has managed to skate through this life into his 40s with a combination of hard work and dumb luck and of course a head start arriving at a comfortable, pretty good life. But still, when I think about how the last 20 years will be studied in the history books, here’s what comes to mind:
The Gun Violence Years
The War Years
The Security State Years
The Recession Years
The Polarization Years
The Disinformation Years
The Pandemic Years
The Climate Change Years
You can call this pessimistic but, it’s just a fact, you can’t hide from national politics. How they work directly effects how life is in America and our collective experience.
And it’s that collective experience I think is most defined by trauma and pain. Sure, we have the Internet, but not universal healthcare. This is the golden age of television, but white supremacy is allowed to run rampant throughout the country. I certainly love the craft beer craze, but I’d rather everybody got their news from accurate sources who actually do journalism.
Time to do better America. We need to define these coming climate change years by opportunity, equity, and balance.
Time to get to it.
- UPDATE -
There’s an important prologue to these years. The initial years of an American experience that set us up for where we’re at today starting in the 80s:
The Anti-Government Years
The HIV/AIDS Years
The Abortion War Years
Pain
Undeniably, there is pain in this country. America is being hobbled by it. As this suffering continues to manifest into vile partisanship, hatred of the other, conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory, and senseless violence, it’s clear to me there is nothing we can do to really progress until we address this pain on a massive scale. To hell with infrastructure week/year, we need to rebuild over the next few decades to get to where we need to be. And to do that, we need to take on the suffering, fully. We need to be people-focused, not capital-focused, which is what we've always been. To hell with money, without a healthy citizenry, in both mind and body, there is no future. We must, must, must, take on this pain.
You can call it a “nanny state” all you want, whatever, we need a government who truly cares about the people it governs. It’s a fundamental change for America which will require a large majority of the people who call this nation home to go through that change together. That’s the work that needs to happen. Everything we do must be an answer to the question “does this help reduce some of the pain?” Because if not, there’s no point. Does this reduce some of the pain, even just a little? That’s what needs to happen. Right fucking now.
This Year
As we get into things, here’s how I hope to approach this year:
Really get after it – work hard
Appreciate I get to do this job – gratitude
Be positive, when possible – outlook: hopeful
It won’t be easy. But with all the people out there trying to make a difference in our current state of affairs, I know it’s possible to move the needle. And we’ll make it happen together.
