A Little Easier

Sat last night with four guys sipping whiskey late into the night talking politics. We're mystified how anyone could vote for the awful orange liar, but mostly discussed how Democrats should support a simple proposition: It should be just a little easier for all Americans to realize economic security. We weren't talking about wealth. Every one of us has kids who are about to go to college. We just want to be able to make that happen without burdening them with crushing debt. None of us feel like we can make that happen. This is a huge part of what's wrong with our country.

One guy referred to an Aaron Sorkin West Wing episode in which a character suggests things should be a little easier:

I never imagined at $55,000 a year, I'd have trouble making ends meet. And my wife brings in another 25. My son's in public school. It's no good. I mean, there's 37 kids in the class, uh, no art and music, no advanced placement classes. Other kids, their mother has to make them practice the piano. You can't pull my son away from the piano. He needs teachers. I spend half the day thinking about what happens if I slip and fall down on my own front porch, you know? It should be hard. I like that it's hard. Putting your daughter through college, that's-that's a man's job. A man's accomplishment. But it should be a little easier. Just a little easier. 'Cause in that difference is... everything. I'm sorry. I'm, uh, I-I'm Matt Kelley.

Matt apologizes because it's unseemly to complain in America. If you're not succeeding, you haven't worked hard enough. That's the National Anthem of our economic country.

Hogwash.

The Democrats' message must be relentlessly positive and absolve Matt Kelley, my friends, and me of guilt. The message must be that if we work hard and save honestly, the game will be made more fair for us and, more importantly, for our children. Every human being in this country deserves a fair chance of reaching for the American dream, no apologies necessary.

Democrats don't need to oppose the tribe of liars across the aisle. They need only work toward restoring fairness, demanding equity, and helping us provide for our own. The United States has sheltered the wealthy for so many years, it is time to take care of those on whom the wealth has been built.

I'll keep thinking about this.

Theft

Following in the lost and found, we lost something else Thursday nigh because some punk took it. What an asshole.

A little after ten at night our daughter texted that she was done with play practice. I went downstairs, opened the garage, and drove to get her. Twenty minutes later, we were home when a neighbor texted that she had seen four tough-looking boys who had been in our garage. Uh oh.

Our other daughter just got her license and doesn't like to carry her wallet. She leaves it in the glove compartment of the car in the garage, the one that is unlocked, the one the kids went through. Her wallet was gone.

This wasn't too terrible. In her wallet were four dollars, her driver's license, a school ID three years out of date, two gift cards, a couple slips of paper, and her bank card. She cancelled the bank card while I went out to see if the thieves had dumped the wallet. A block away I found the empty wallet. She said, "at least I don't have to buy a new wallet."

This morning, walking the dog, my wife found the slips of paper. While we were at school a stranger found the license and left it in our mailbox. This afternoon, walking the dog, we found the gift cards. In total, our girl is out four dollars and an old high school ID. She doesn't even have to wait for a bank card. The phone app still works.

I told her, you lead a pretty good life. She nodded.

Last night, around midnight I found the clip on our Wyzecam of the boys walking down the street. A big puke of a kid peels off and goes into our garage. He waddles out a minute later with the wallet. I stayed awake imagining happy endings such as him getting arrested, shot in a driveby, or somehow having his nuts sliced off. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the father.

I see how people turn to a hard kind of politics. I wanted that lard ass on a platter. My daughter figures he's from her high school just like the kid who broke into our house a few years ago. I think that kid is in jail and I'm okay with him rotting there. I debated the proper fate for this new kid for an hour last night, but it's a bad idea to make decisions when feeling hurt, angry, and unsafe. Better to respond than react. Locking the car in the garage and closing the door at night even when I'll be right back, these are wise responses. Getting lost in revenge is a bad reaction that gets in the way of my living a good life.

I had revenge on a kid like this once. In middle school, Robert was a prick who bullied the hell out of me. I imagined every pains I wanted to befall him. Fifteen years later, at a traffic light, I saw him in a shitbox car, a cigarette in his mouth, a grimace marring his face. He looked old and rundown. I'll admit that made me happy. Living well may be the only real revenge.

The moron who took our daughter's wallet got four dollars but it won't be worth even that much. Our girl will keep going, onward and upward. That piece of shit is likely already circling the bowl. My final thought of him last night was that he probably has only a fifty-fifty shot of surviving the next ten years.

With all our daughter's stuff restored, with a new understanding of keeping ourselves safe, and with the notion that the thief doesn't matter much to me, I bet I sleep just fine tonight.

Found

This is how the lost morning continued.

I put the coffee water on to boil, ground the beans, pushed two slices of bread down in the toaster. But the loss of the pen was killing me. It's got to be in the car, I thought, imagining it falling out of my fleece pocket and rolling under the seat. I grabbed the flashlight and my keys and, still in cat puke pajamas and undershirt, still barefoot, set out to search my car. Passing the kitchen table, I picked up my daughter's drawstring bag. Why, I don't know, but I did and you know what was there: the pen.

The Democrats took a majority in the House. An adult will be in the Speaker's chair for a change. There will be investigations of the big orange monster. There might even be redistricting because several Democratic governors were elected. It may be small, but there will be some check on the dismantling of our union. Our local repugnican will hold onto his office, but Claudia Tenney probably won't. Rachel May was elected as our State Senator and will be a full-on Liberal Democrat.

I would soon change out of my pajamas into pants unsullied by the cat. My cold wasn't so bad and the coffee would feel good on my throat. My wife promotes tea with honey for these things and I'm sure she's right, but, ew, tea.

And when I looked at the clock, somehow I was on time if not a couple minutes ahead of schedule. I would get to my job on time like it or not. That job has gone downhill, but the pay is good and it provides my family with health insurance. There are possibilities on the horizon and the worsening of the job has pushed me to take more risks and try new things.

I stood in the kitchen and heard the kettle come to a boil. The toaster glowed orange on the counter. The furnace kicked on and warm air blew over me. I reached out and picked up my pen from the table. I didn't smile, but I felt my shoulders relax and when I exhaled it was as if the air in my lungs had been weighing me down. I closed my fist around the pen and held it tight. The cat jumped up on the table and meowed at me. I pushed her off. I didn't want her to go puking up there.

I'm not sure my hope was renewed but maybe my faith was if even just a little. Whatever the case, I had my pen and when I went to make the coffee, I set it down atop my notebook where it belongs. I made the coffee, spread butter and jam on my toast, changed into pants not sullied by puke, pulled on and buttoned an oxford, and returned to the table to eat breakfast. I slipped the pen into my breast pocket, clipping it securely there next to my heart which throughout everything keeps on beating as if this is just the way life works.

Lost

This is how the morning began.

I woke but couldn't imagine why until the third alarm. I shut if off but lay in bed for warmth. One cat jumped on me. I pushed her away but heard the other cat puke downstairs. I remembered then that I had to shower. Time to get up. I was so tired.

In the shower I thought about the midterms, how Democrats lost Senate seats and our repugnant held his House seat. There won't be any real check on the monster in the Oval Office. We lost. Again. What is wrong with this country? I wondered.

I went downstairs, crossed the dark living room to get my bag, and stepped in cat puke. Hopping on one foot into the kitchen for paper towel I found the roll empty and by then had slicked the inside of my pajama leg. I sighed, found paper towel, cleaned myself and the floor thinking I should call in sick (I've got a cold), and go back to bed, but I needed to write morning pages. Out loud, I asked, where have I put my pen.

Understand that I write with only two fountain pens, one from 2008, the other from 2011. Aside from my wedding band, they are my most prized possessions. I always have them. But the 2011 pen filled with blue ink wasn't in my bag or my fleece, wasn't on the table or desk, and wasn't anywhere I could find it. I was already a few minutes behind because of the shower and the cat puke. I didn't have time to search but went outside barefoot in cat-puke pajamas and a white undershirt to search my car. It wasn't there. Back inside and running late, I grabbed my other pen and wrote a version of this. The next paragraph read: **

Maybe the pen is in some dark crevice of my car. Maybe it's in the house somewhere I don't expect. But there's the chance it's in the parking lot near the Carrier Dome or on the shoulder of Route 81 South. I just don't know. The combination of not knowing and feeling as though I am a fool for losing it is eating me up.

I was tired from staying up late watching bad results from the election. Having been sidetracked by bathing, cat puke, and a lost pen, I was running late for a job I didn't want to go to anyway but at which I'm stuck for the time being. In this state, a lost pen, one I've held onto for seven years is enough to ruin my whole damn morning.

It was a chance to practice letting go and accepting. I need more practice at those things, let me tell you. I finished my pages and went back to the kitchen for breakfast and to make the coffee, morning pretty much shot and hope fairly run out.

But wait, there's more to this story coming soon.