face(s) of America

Wallace Shawn, "Developments Since My Birth," NYRB:

Over the decades of my life, America’s morale has declined, I’d say. There was a dignity to feeling kind and good. It was enjoyable. On the other hand, the lack of connection between what we felt we were and what we actually were was dangerous and led to the death of a lot of people. Personally, I have nothing to complain about in regard to my country. America has always been good to me, and so it’s really hard for me to believe that Donald Trump’s face is the true face of America. If I look back at my own life, I’d have to say that the sunny faces of the soldiers in postwar Europe, the friendly faces of the boys who lifted me up to sit in their jeeps, seem like better representations of the way I’ve been treated, and so for me those faces really do seem like the face of my country. But for those countless others, in the cities and towns of the USA and in countries far away, to whom America has not been good, the face of America has always and forever been the face of Donald Trump.

Matthew Yglesias, "America Needs a Democratic Revolution": 

All of these outcomes—in which Republicans hold power despite winning fewer votes—are baked into the American system. They won’t go away if Trump is removed from office. It’s become commonplace for Democrats’ rhetoric to cast Trump’s presidency as a threat to American democracy. But it would be more accurate to say his presidency is a consequence of our constitutional system’s democratic shortcomings. If Democrats manage to win in November, they owe it to their voters to make a serious effort to lead a democratic revolution in the United States that would truly bury Trumpism once and for all.

Dean Baker says it one more time:

A common problem in policy circles is that government protections that redistribute income upward are defined as part of the market, and getting rid of them or weakening them is described as government intervention. This issue comes up most frequently with government-granted patent monopolies with prescription drugs. Any measure to lower prices by weakening patent monopoly protections is treated as government intervention, while the patent monopoly itself is treated as the free market. And, just to remind people, patent monopolies on prescription drugs cost us more than $400 billion annually, more than twice the amount at stake with the Trump tax cut.

untethered and weighed down

I'm struggling. Not sleeping much -- that's both a symptom and a cause. I've socialized more in the past week than I had in quite a while and I'm sure it has helped. But still I feel alone, alone, alone. Untethered. My head is aching and my eyes are heavy and dry, except when I am crying. Woe. Is. Me. 

Perfectly normal. The human condition. And yet. 

I was walking through Silver Terrace on my way to the farmers market last Saturday, thinking -- and maybe even talking -- to myself about Constance stringing me along like a needy girlfriend she doesn't want to deal with but isn't quite ready to dump. Resolving to find a new designer. Then I tripped over the raised edge of a sidewalk square. I had been walking down a fairly steep hill, so I couldn't right myself. I landed on my palms, and also on my right forearm; my left knee bore the brunt of the lower body impact. A man came out of his garage and asked me, worriedly, if I was alright and did I want a bottle of water. I waved him off -- I hope I did it politely. I kept walking, flexing and worrying about my knee and my right wrist and forearm. 

Later, when I went to bed, I realized that I had a sharp pain just below my right breast -- I had smashed my clip-on case when I landed and I guess it must have jabbed me in that spot. I haven't seen any discoloration or swelling. I think I bruised a rib (or two?). For several days it was painful to breathe deeply or do sit-ups. It still hurts, a week later. But it's healing. 

I thought about mom, of course. She keeps saying that they are providing us with a dry run for old age. I am on my way to old age, that's for sure. 

left behind

I was up late thinking about the patterns of recent history -- the way people with money pick up and leave, taking their money and privileges with them. (I am old enough to have been "left behind" by white flight.) Because when I was on the phone with nb last night she started talking about leaving California. She inadvertently triggered my resentment of (other) white people by saying "California has left me" -- which took me back to 1980, when so-called Democrats voted for Reagan because, they said, the party had left them. 

I know she's gotta do what she's gotta do, and so do we all. But the conversation left me feeling bereft in yet another way. And alone. I doubt very much that I'm going to find another partner -- it's been 20 years since I got divorced and not much has happened on the romantic front in all that time. To some extent this has been a choice I made. So I guess I should try to think about how to live whatever is left of my life.