This is the first in a series of thoughtful-I can say that because I’m the writer-posts about our current situation and the big election coming up and where we might or ought to be going. Maybe.
Part 1: Coming Soon to Your Neighborhood.
Perhaps it is inevitable that the desire for change becomes so hopeless that terror and anger overtake our better angels and we gleefully join the mobs burning and pillaging. Every so often, in order to rebuild, we must burn down the house.
That certainly appears to be the case these days if you follow a certain president who , along with his acolytes, is warning of terror and chaos coming to a town near you. My town, or perhaps I should say my metropolis, has already garnished favor in the president’s eye as we’ve been mentioned as a hotbed of doom and disaster. Consequently, I’ve been waiting with baited breath for the end of the world.
Words cannot express my disappointment that, in fact, nothing of the kind has come to pass.
I live in a sleepy-do people still use that term?-suburb of Seattle, which is home to CHOP and soon to be nothing more than a burned-out hole of its former glory. Those of us in the burbs are waiting for the huns of liberalism, or whatever they’re called, to ravage and defile our quaint little burg. I would say that gloom pervades, but actually, it’s been quite nice here, with many people out walking and chatting at the appropriate distance. The neighborhood kids can be heard playing and shouting and being noisy as all kids should be in the summertime. There’s nary a barricade or militias patrolling the area. If it weren’t for the fact that no one is really going anywhere or doing many get together things, life is much as it is normally at this time of year.
And here I cleaned grandpa’s shotgun for nothing.
Now, I’m not stupid enough to buy in on the idea that doom will soon descend upon us, just as I know that, despite what the TV news or the Internet may say about Seattle burning, it is not. There are 6 city blocks on Capitol Hill that have borne the brunt of the protests and, sadly, there’s been death and property damage. But if you move out beyond that small perimeter, nothing remotely like that is happening in the rest of the city. Same in the burbs. And it’s the same in every big city named to frighten those who don’t live here and fear the worse.
One might also point out that if law and order are to be upheld by the guy who wants to be re-elected, then why isn’t he doing that now? He is the president now. Why do we have to wait? Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but then it isn’t meant to. It’s meant to frighten and shock, and it gives the Russians working to undermine our elections something to do.
We all need a purpose and something to look forward to.
©2020 David William Pearce
David William Pearce, Writer 