A Sweet Calming Wave

Tomorrow morning I will wake up at 6am and it will be 5pm on the East Coast of The United States of America, or maybe it will be 7pm, I hate timezones; either way it will be evening and there will be piles and piles of election results for me to sift through on my tiny phone screen as I sit in bed in the darkness holding my breath, hoping that America proved that is the hopeful place I know it can be, and not the ignorant cesspool of hatred that I have seen it to be.


So much has already been written about this election, that I feel inadequate to add anything useful to the conversations at this late stage of the game. We have all drawn up sides and there is no convincing anyone otherwise.


I wish it were different.


I wish that we had subtle nuanced political discourse that allowed our diverse electorate a chance to vote on candidates that resented their needs and interests, but we are beholden to a reality TV style election, that let’s be honest- we might just deserve.


We are all in safely hunkered down in our insulated bubbles casting out jabs and punches and slings and arrows. We hurl quotes and share videos from Samantha Bee and Ann Coulter. Seth Meyer and Rudy Guiliani. It’s an interactive circus run by demented clowns. We are all nervous and punchy and dangerous.


We are all hopeful that somehow tomorrow, that when our side wins, it will all be over and we can go back to caring about….what was it that we cared about again?


But the scariest part is that this is not going to end tomorrow. This wound will bleed for years to come and the scar will leave a mark. Actually what we are experiencing is the same wound, reopened from the Civil War. But having said that...


I am hopeful that Hillary will win in a landslide.


I am an optimist. I believe in humanity and decency. I believe there are more people in American who side with love than hatred. I believe in progress and healing and evolution.


I believe that while it is easy to pick on our simplicity and backwardness that there are more Americans that believe we are ready for a woman president, that immigrants are not the cause of our problems, that Muslims worldwide suffer from terrorism more than we do, that people of the LGBTQ communities are intertwined in all of our communities, that women should have the right to choose what to do with their reproductive rights, that we need to look at structural racism. I believe that beyond the smoke screens and propaganda, that deep in our hearts Americans know that #blacklivesmatter and that climate change is real.


We believe in peace, liberty and justice for all.


I believe that if you take Americans from rural Alabama and put them in a room with people from inner-city Ferguson that they will find common ground. That all we need is to look past the rhetoric and lies and politics and media and into our hearts to know what is the right thing to do. I believe that there are still enough people in America who believe in America to make the promise real. And I believe that they will come out on election day and be heard.


At it’s simplest to be an optimist means that you must to believe in love.


I have to believe these things, because I am not sure I can go to work tomorrow if the results I see on my phone in the darkness at 6am show Trump winning or anywhere near a close call.


A Hillary win will not solve our problems. And while I will freely admit that I have been swayed by her slick propaganda machine, I nearly cried showing my daughters her final video tonight, I do know that at this stage in our countries lives, progressives need to feel that at least we haven't moved further right. That we are not a nation of racists and bigots.


The woman we elect will not be the champion of the left that we deserve, but at least her lies are closer to our truths than his. Her victory we will be a weak mandate for liberals and in any election year that is better than any mandate for ultra-right lunacy.


Everyday at lunch, I talk about this election with my non-American colleagues and none of us get it. How can you explain Trumpism to anyone with a head or a heart.


Here’s to hoping that tomorrow as I am sitting through a million hours of parent-teacher conferences and checking in on the stats, that I see each state turn blue- one after the other like a sweet calming wave cleansing our nation and preparing us for the work ahead.

Ordinary Usage

The quest to discover a definition for "literature" is a road that is much travelled, though the point of arrival, if ever reached, is seldom satisfactory. Most attempted definitions are broad and vague, and they inevitably change over time. In fact, the only thing that is certain about defining literature is that the definition will change. Concepts of what is literature change over time as well.


Ain’t it just like the night to play tricks when you’re tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded, though we’re all doin’ our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, temptin’ you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there’s nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind


Literature, in its broadest sense, is any single body of written works. More restrictively, it is writing considered as an art form, or any single writing deemed to have artistic or intellectual value, often due to deploying language in ways that differ from ordinary usage. Its Latin root literatura/litteratura (derived itself from littera: letter or handwriting) was used to refer to all written accounts, though contemporary definitions extend the term to include texts that are spoken or sung (oral literature). Literature can be classified according to whether it is fiction or non-fiction and whether it is poetry or prose; it can be further distinguished according to major forms such as the novel, short story or drama; and works are often categorized according to historical periods or their adherence to certain aesthetic features or expectations (genre).


Though you might hear laughing, spinning, swinging madly through the sun
It's not aimed at anyone
It's just escaping on the run
And but for the sky there are no fences facing
And if you hear vague traces of skipping reels of rhyme
To your tambourine in time
It's just a ragged clown behind
I wouldn't pay it any mind
It's just a shadow you're seeing that he's chasing


The concept has changed meaning over time: nowadays it can broaden to have non-written verbal art forms, and thus it is difficult to agree on its origin, which can be paired with that of language or writing itself.


They’re selling postcards of the hanging
They’re painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
The circus is in town
Here comes the blind commissioner
They’ve got him in a trance
One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker
The other is in his pants
And the riot squad they’re restless
They need somewhere to go
As Lady and I look out tonight
From Desolation Row


The haters on Twitter are all bent out of shape because Bob Dylan just won the Nobel Prize for literature, as if their 147 character indignant temper tantrums come anywhere close to the life work of one of the greatest poets, writers and artist of any generation.


Decade after decade Dylan has used words to crack open our universe in ways we didn’t know were possible. I could careless about awards or whether or not someone deserves one, but to watch people disrespect a body of work from an artist who has always been true to words and language and stories, feels unfair.


The man is a legend and one of my favourite story tellers.


His words have lit a constant path for me. I remember as a child listening to Blowin’ In The Wind with -, to this moment losing myself in a Don’t Think Twice demo. His words are the easiest for me to sing and his voice an echo of my own. I don’t know anything about Nobel and their criteria, but I do know that Bob Dylan deserves any award that values stories.


…


The day was slow and warm and wet. We went to the waterslide park. Rode a few slides. Swam in the lazy river. Came home to dinner and a movie in the dark.


…


I am looking forward to seeing how much worse this Trump shitshow can get. Every morning promises a deeper look into the carnival. This campaign is making it difficult to believe in Democracy. I can’t imagine how anyone can take America seriously ever again. It’s hard to parent and/or teach in a world where a man who talks about ten year olds in a sexual manner is not arrested, let alone running to be president.


He can’t be real. This campaign cannot be real. There has to be some kind of Manchurian experiment, where a group of people decided to create the worst person imaginable and see what would happen if they asked a country to take him seriously. This campaign will be a blight on the American consciousness for generations to come.


Sure, we survived Nixon and Reagan and Bush Sr. and Bush Jr, but this is much much worse. This campaign has revealed a puss filled tumor in our collective psyche that has already spread its cancer to places that we won’t fully realize for years to come.


We have sewn our very own Frankenstein. And I won’t lie it is pretty entertaining watching him tear himself apart. But, all monsters become more gruesome as their desperation takes over. Fear turns into anger and anger into destruction. Things are going to get worse before they get better.


God bless America indeed.


Colin Kaepernick might start this week, and although I hate his team, I hope he throws for a 400 yards and 5 touchdowns. Team Trump and all the maggots grovelling at his feet are due for a stiff uppercut, before we enjoy the TKO.