E for ENOUGH

Got stuck for an “e” word that could be blogged about and then it hit me.  If you toy around with a thought long and seriously, sometimes the right blog, the right topic, word, whatever—well, it hits you full force.  Not always at a convenient time or where you have the means to get it on paper or in cyberspace, but it is there and it stays until you know it is what you were “meant” to say.  And tonight, I am worn out, tired physically and mentally and emotionally, and cannot sleep nor rest until I write my words on “ENOUGH.”  This will probably cost me in terms of ever being read again, as I will use the words of the person who is the one in charge of our country, and many will find it offensive.  But I believe a writer has to be honest and have integrity if they wish to be read.  So here goes.

Yesterday, I turned on the morning news and watched young people march against being gunned down in their schools and stand up for their right to live.  Yes, live.  They did not want thoughts and prayers; they wanted our government to take common sense actions to allow them to attend school without fear of being gunned down while there.  I watched parents of children who did not survive “school shootings” plead for their children and all the children killed as they united with the young people to demand common sense reform and laws to prevent future tragedies.  Previously, I heard Trump say there would be reform.  I heard him scoff at legislators for being afraid of the NRA.  Then he went to lunch with leaders from the NRA and suddenly the reforms were replaced with thoughts and prayers again and teachers were going to be armed and already have wounded themselves and their students in their protective status.  I shake my head.

My dreams last night were filled with words like, “I love Dreamers!  I want to protect Dreamers.  I love all the Dreamers!” and Dreamers are being harassed and ICE moving at an even swifter speed to break up families and deport ALL illegal immigrants, regardless of status, criminal records, abiding by the immigration laws.  Their fate is tenuous and they are afraid.  When asked what HE decided on Dreamers, it was not HIS fault but rather the other political party’s mess.  And people in our country hide in fear of being detained, deported, and becoming victims of hate crimes.

My dreams were also filled with scenes from Charlottesville where “there were good people on both sides” as I remembered seeing White Supremacists and KKK, Neo Nazis carry torches and attack people of color and threaten them, ram a car into and kill a young woman who opposed hatred.  And I saw police stand by as guns were aimed by these good people at people of color, or ganged up on and beat the non-white people.  Of course, I could not un-see or un-hear the words of hate and racism, the flags not of our country but of Nazi Germany flying and being carried.  And then my dreams took me from there to the same person calling football players who took a knee during the playing of the National Anthem in silent protest “sons of bitches who ought to be fired!”   Weren’t there “good” people there, too?  Were they disrespectful or disruptive?  No, they were tired of people who were not white being killed, disparaged, supposedly citizens in equal standing being discriminated against by the “good” racists on the other side, the person calling them “sons of bitches” being one of them.  

I got up from my nightmare, walked around, tried to wake up fully, so I could go back to what I hoped would be a numbing sleep.  But it was not so.  I heard the person in the White House threatening “Rocket Man” with nuclear war, that his nuclear button was bigger.  I broke into a sweat again, as I had when I realized this angry and ill-informed person could get the United States literally fried because he wanted to be the big guy with the biggest button.  And then my mind worried about the detainees being held before being deported and I kept hearing about “shithole countries” and all Mexicans being rapists and murderers even as some of the most wonderful doctors, scientists, writers, artists have all come from “shithole countries.”  

  I got up again, and my head was throbbing.  I thought of the #me too people,  the blatant pride in “Pussy grabbing” and then the “I love and respect women.  All women.  I Respect women and love women.”  I had to question—like he loves the Dreamers?  Evidently since he has married three immigrant women, had numerous allegations about pussy grabbing women, makes obscene and untoward remarks about women around him from our country and others as well.  And he definitely has women admirers in Conway, Huckabee-Sanders, Hicks, Ivanka.

So an entire night’s sleep was shot.  I finished off the dream with a military parade for the esteemed person in the White house opposite images of starving Veterans who were ill and dying people from lack of health care.  Of course, I cannot forget the great WALL to be built along with an ego.  And at work today, I was tired and fraught with lingering images from last night’s nightmare.  Tonight, I will not stifle my words, my soul, my heart.

Tonight, I sit and write this with one word in mind—ENOUGH!  As a teacher, I have kicked students out for name-calling and racist remarks while teaching college classes.  I would not tolerate one person calling another a sonofabitch in my class.  I would fail any student that could not argue their point with only “it’s not my fault!  It’s them!” and then name-calling.  I would not accept money to GIVE a grade.  I would not tolerate the kind of behavior I have witnessed in a kindergartner, much less junior high age or high school age.  I refuse to tolerate such imbecility and profane and denigrating speech and words from someone who claims to “Lead” the United States.  

If at a WOK meeting you heard someone refer to another person with name-calling, you would not tolerate it.  If you were ridiculed for your dress, your heritage, your religion, your culture, you would walk out—never to return.  Well, consider the Writers of Kern a microcosm of the world stage.  The world is not putting up with this either.  But in the meantime, I, and many others, have had ENOUGH.  Money and prestige are not synonymous with character and leadership.  They are not a license to degrade and disrespect the lives of those who don’t agree with us.  It is not excusable nor acceptable to spout profanities and name-calling like third graders when something or someone displeases us.  And it is ENOUGH that not only is our country being threatened from without, but from within by a wannabe dictator/king/despot who throws tantrums to get his way and eliminates people like he throws away his KFC box when he's through.  Or I hope he throws it away!  Of course pollution and climate change and the health of the planet have never interested him.

It is ENOUGH that we have an ignorant head of state.  But it is more than ENOUGH that this person is destroying and endangering the lives of all who live here.  Children and young people should not fear in school.  The planet should not be plundered.  The ill and poor should not fear death as a constant threat.  IF  education is to continue at all, history must be taught, lessons learned, and ENOUGH caring to stop the hate, bigotry, racism.  

I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!  I’m tired of turning on the news to see who is being fired, killed, poisoned, called names, paying the most money to get what they want.  Our future generations deserve better!  WE deserve better.  Move the people of Haiti here, move the person in the White House to Haiti and let him make a shithole country great.  Ours was pretty good until he got in.

Okay—maybe tonight I can sleep.  If you despise me, so be it.  If you feel similarly, thank you.  Whatever your stance, thank you for the chance to be honest and believe me when I say I will be voting in every election held around me and in the country.  Because ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

Good night—I’m done in.