Spit it out

Before going on about where I've been and where I'm going next,

I'm gonna have to just lay it out on the table;

otherwise it's ignoring the elephant in the room.

I do it as much to remind myself as to remind any of you ...

 what we're experiencing in our national life is not normal.

~~~~~

It is not normal for the government to kidnap over 2000 indigenous children

and hide them in secret 'shelters' spread across the country,

with no plans whatsoever to reunite them with their families.

Yes, I suspect I know, more than most, that it's been done before;

when Native children were sent to boarding schools that were designed

"to kill the Indian in order to save the child".

(A cup that was found among my great grandmothers possessions when she died in 1958)

The fact that evil was previously done in our name

in no way mitigates the pain and horror of it being done again.

We're supposed to be evolving, people;

not giving in to our basest instincts and fears.

~~~~~

It is not normal to have a leader with co-morbid conditions of

 malignant narcissism, pathological inability to tell the truth and galloping capriciousness.

~~~~~
 It is not normal for said leader to create and provoke an international crisis
with an equally insecure, immature and stunted political leader
with nuclear weapons

 and then expect prizes when a staged photo op reportedly 'ends'
all the trash talk.
~~~~~

It is not normal that we have a First Lady who blatantly admits not caring 

about her role or any interest beyond her own family.

As disturbing as it is,

some of us wish her husband would be equally as honest.

 ~~~~~

 It is not normal to have a government
that steals money from the majority of its citizens

 in order to benefit the 1%.

~~~~~

It is not normal for the government to propose abolishing child labor laws

and combining the Departments of Education and Labor.

~~~~~

Maybe I should clarify;

it is not normal for a functioning, participatory democracy 

to have any of those conditions;

it's perfectly consistent, however, for a declining democracy
that is rapidly sinking into a fascist state.

~~~~~

It is not normal to have so many citizens

blinded by what's happening in our country.

It is not normal to feel such despair about the irreversible damage
being done to our country and the people who inhabit it,
the ones who are woke
and the ones who are not.

Nothing about our current national life is 'normal' in any sense of the word.