Putting Away the Past
What are the behaviors that have led us to our present reality?
As I take down Christmas at the lake, transferring Santa Clauses, reindeer, gnomes, sleighs, Christmas trees, garlands, and ornaments onto the bed, I open my closet door, and decide my house is in need of cleaning.
It’s Inauguration Day; four years ago, I watched it with my Mom, in the hospital where she was receiving a round of chemotherapy. It was an all-day process that started at 5:00 am and ended late in the evening, when our new president and the first lady were dancing at the Inaugural Ball. I was grateful for the distraction from her collapsed veins, plummeting heart rate, and the slow drip of poison intended to irradiate the cancer infiltrating her besieged body.
I remember thinking Trump wants to make America great again and all I wanted was to make my Mom well again. I wondered what the world would think of chemotherapy and Trump a hundred years from now? Well, chemo certainly didn’t heal my Mom: she died 5 months later, and my sister and I went about maintaining the legacy of the family. I feel as if our nation has been doing much the same, fighting inefficacious leadership, political discord, and recently an infectious virus, all the while struggling to maintain the legacy of our great nation…
