The Death of Optimism?

This morning, a headline from a story from NBC news caught my eye:

Fauci says U.S. must “hunker down” for Fall and Winter

Then the money quote in the first paragraph of the story:

“ Don’t ever, ever underestimate the potential of the pandemic. And don’t try to look at the rosy side of things.”

Somewhere, Norman Vincent Peale is rolling over in his grave.

Apparently, the Era of Optimism is officially over, the power of positive thinking, a thing of the past. All those corny songs from the old days about Accentuating the Positive and walking on the sunny side of the street are relics from a bygone era. Today is all about sober acceptance of the worst case scenarios of life.

Look...I get it. Constantly downplaying the seriousness of COVID is foolish. Breezily dismissing the deaths of nearly 200,000 Americans as some sort of hoax is ignorant and dangerous. But, my experience of 62 years informs me that things seldom if ever turn out as bad as predicted. Maybe this will be the exception, but better than expected outcomes have had an astonishing record of dependability for most of my life. So, with all due respect to Dr. Fauci, I will take COVID seriously, but I will not succumb to pessimistic acceptance of the inevitability of the “potential” of this pandemic. There’s another potential at play here, Doc, and that’s the potential of a vaccine, the potential of better outcomes than the models have suggested. If I have to make a bet on which potential wins, I’ll put my money and my energy on...success, not failure.

The Fall and Winter might very well be dark. But if all of us give ourselves over to the inevitability of the darkness, we guarantee its arrival.

Wear your mask. Wash your hands. Be considerate of others. Practice Social distancing. But remain positive and optimistic as the weather turns colder. Reject pessimism. Hold on fast to hope.

A Brutal Reminder

Every once in a while we humans are confronted with the inexorable passage of time and the debilitating impact it has on us. Most of the time we are too busy to notice. Then suddenly it appears, staring us in the face. We are always surprised, taken aback by the decline and fall. We shouldn’t be, but we are. It was that way with a friend today. He looked at me, straight in the face, as it dawned on him that his memory had completely failed. He had not remembered what we had just been talking about. His eyes became vacant, as if he was seeing someone else beside me, someone he didn’t know at all. He caught himself, realized that I had driven a long way to talk with him about something of which he no longer had any memory. He became embarrassed. His eyes filled with tears. We both fell into a painful silence. 

I had heard rumors of his decline, but until this awkward moment, I had no evidence that it was true. But now there is no ambiguity. He is no longer able to rely on his mind to tell him the truth. I can no longer council him with the confidence that he is comprehending my advice. It is a bitter pill for both of us. The moment when the realization of his diminishment registered on his face will be one that I will never forget.

The slow train of cognition winds its way through the mountains at its own pace, slowly for some, brutally swift for others. But it comes for us all eventually. Unfortunately for me, I get to observe its arrival more so than most because of the nature of my work. I hate it. I hate that its so arbitrary. I hate the unfairness of it all. I leave each of these encounters diminished, drained of something for a while, until life’s momentum sweeps me up again in its mighty current. Tonight, I think about my friend, the terrified look on his face, and the heavy silence that descended in that dark moment, and I am reminded of the words of the Psalmist, “Boast not thyself of tomorrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth...”

With Friends Like Me...

So, my friend is having a colonoscopy today. She's had a rough couple of weeks, what with her reconstructive surgery getting cancelled last minute when the surgeon had to quarantine for COVID. Now, she’s been fasting for the last 36 hours leading up to today’s procedure. So, what do I do to encourage her through these dark hours? This:

Does this make me a terrible person? Perhaps. Showing someone images of delicious food when they are fasting and starving to death might be considered thoughtless and cruel to some. However, to others it will be seen for what it is...a fiendishly clever ploy to make the recipient of such photographs simultaneously amused and angry, and temporarily distracted from her hunger. Instead of obsessing over how starved she feels, she is now wondering what she ever did to deserve having a friend like me?! I think her personal favorite was this next one I sent her with the subtitle: You, on the ride home after your colonoscopy...

The Great Lake House Hunt

The Great Lake House hunt of 2020 is in full swing. It is at once exciting and frustrating, exhilarating and disappointing. The problem seems to be there are too many people like us—out of staters—gobbling up real estate in Maine, attempting to flee the big cities of the northeast and COVID. A house will go on the market and have a dozen offers in ten minutes, people perfectly willing to buy the place sight unseen. That’s not our style. So, the search continues.

Here’s the real dilemma. For us, especially Pam, the lake is the thing. Do we want a nice house? Sure. We have requirements of the house that are non-negotiable. But the house could be absolutely perfect but if it’s on a tiny uninteresting lake, no sale. To the contrary, if the house needs lots of work, but sits on the edge of the right lake, we would be all in. We aren’t the type of people who go to the lake to sit on the deck and enjoy the scenery. We spend the majority of our time in Maine either on the dock or on the water. We fish, kayak, paddle board. If it were possible we would take all of our meals on the dock! So far, we haven’t found the right combination of house and lake. But the journey has just begun. Our realtor insists that people will start listing their houses up there after Labor Day. That’s when more opportunities will appear. 

One more thing about this search. We have discovered that the region of Maine that has our heart—MidCoast—is home to the priciest real estate in the state. If we were willing to expand our search to include the Downeast areas of Bar Harbor etc.,we might find more properties at better prices. I’m sure this is true. But, here’s the deal...there’s a reason why we love the Camden/Rockland/Rockport area. It’s beautiful, yes, but it’s also less touristy. There aren’t any cruise ships docking in these waters. It calls itself “Where the Mountains meet the sea.” We have been enchanted for nearly ten years now. So, if it’s been our dream to buy a place here, we need not give up that dream too quickly being in too big a rush to buy a place. Patience is a virtue, or so I’m told. Although I have no first hand experience with the concept, I intend to test the truth of that expression over the next month or so when we return for our second 2020 trip.

Wish us luck!

What Are You Afraid Of?

What are you afraid of? It’s an important question, perhaps the most important question of this moment. It is the Holy Grail of politics because when they find out the answer, they will find a way to exploit it. Politicians know that the quickest and most powerful way to motivate voters is to tap in to their darkest fears. It is a strategy that has worked for years and continues to work today. Resentment, anger and grievance are important, sure...but fear is where the big money has always been. Political consultants, the job that has managed to dislodge used car salesman from the top of the most loathsome profession list, have earned their money by crafting messages intended to exploit our fears. It is the coin of the realm. No Presidential candidate can succeed without this exploitation. When you hear the term motivating the base it actually means...scaring the base. Whoever wins in November will be the candidate who does the best job of scaring you. Remember that on November 3rd.

Here are just a few examples of the ways political parties have tried to scare me over the years. This is not an exhaustive list. There are lots more, but these are the ones that stand out in my memory.

I remember being warned in 1980 that if I voted for Ronald Reagan, he would provoke a nuclear war with the Soviet Union.

I remember being warned in 1992 that Bill Clinton was a closet Socialist and wanted to dismantle the military.

In 2008, I was warned that if Barack Obama was elected, private property rights would be eviscerated, the economy would collapse, and my taxes would triple.

In 2016, I was assured that Hillary Clinton was a lesbian who, along with George Soros, would usher in Socialism on a grand scale.

Not to be outdone, I was warned that a vote for Donald Trump would result in homosexuals and all immigrants living in America being rounded up and sent to re-education camps...or something.

Now, the warnings are coming hot and heavy, so fast and furious that I can barely keep up. A Joe Biden Presidency is a carefully orchestrated head fake that will end with him being declared mentally incompetent and being replaced by Kamal Harris, a far left Socialist committed to destroying the economy and ramming slavery reparations down our throats. Even worse, electing Biden/Harris will result in the wholesale raping and pillaging of American suburbs by mobs of Antifa/BLM thugs.

Meanwhile, four more years of Donald Trump will usher in a shooting civil war and the installation of American Nazism, with Donald Trump our 21st century Adolf Hitler.

It’s a wonder any of us have the courage to get out of bed in the morning.

The fact that literally NONE of the horror stories that I have been warned about for the past 40 years actually happened, it doesn’t seem to make any difference. The American voter continues to fall for it, we continue to be manipulated. Nobody votes for anybody out of a sense of hope or joy at the prospect of a brighter future. Instead we vote to stave off some form of Armageddon, to keep the sinister wolves at bay.

I’m sick of it...aren’t you?

Thank You

With regards to yesterday’s blog, an observation. I have always found it fascinating that human beings can observe the same event, examine the same man, yet come away with wildly different conclusions. We see this all the time throughout society, from the very smart men and women on the Supreme Court, to the ordinary men and women who sit on juries, down to the very stupid people who end up in politics. Humans disagree. 

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who offered an opinion on He Fights. Some of you were in agreement with my views on Donald Trump. Others took the time to voice a contrary viewpoint on the man. But, everyone did so respectfully, without ad hominem attacks on me or each other. It ended up being a forum for people to state their views about a contentious subject without it turning into a dumpster fire of accusation and bad faith. For this I am grateful and encouraged.

Thank You, and have a great weekend.

He Fights

I have done a reasonably good job of staying clear of politics in this space, especially considering that there’s an election going on, but to totally ignore the ugly elephant in the room seems a bit gutless. So, today I will enter that swamp of horrors. In doing so I am fully aware that I will anger, disappoint, frustrate and annoy at least half of you, maybe more. I know this because there are lots of people in my life, people who I love and respect, who support a man who I find to be a loathsome embarrassment. In my desire to understand rather than be understood, I have recently asked many of them a simple question, “What is it about Donald Trump that makes you support his re-election?” The answers I have gotten have been interesting, to say the least.

First of all, almost everyone I have asked begins their answer with a disclaimer that goes something like this: Look, I know he can be a real asshole...or, Sure, he tells a lot of lies, and I wish he would get off Twitter. But then, after acknowledging his deficiencies of character, they invariably say some variation of this, “But Doug, he fights!”

I don’t think that I have ever encountered a simple declarative sentence pregnant with more mischief than...he fights. If ever there was a sentence in greater need of a prepositional phrase, I can’t imagine what it would be. He fights...is begging for clarification such as:

He fights...against what?

He fights...for whom?

He fights...on whose behalf?

He fights...to what end?

When pressed, my friends struggle to finish the sentence. “He just fights. He doesn’t take any s**t from anybody.”

When I follow up with something like, “But, what has all this fighting accomplished? Are we better off because of his fighting? Is he better off ? What has all this combativeness gotten us?”, they usually answer some versions of, “He’s got all the right enemies! He hates the same people I hate!” When I ask, “like who?”, they answer, “For one thing, the press!!” Back and forth we go.

Ok, combativeness, in and of itself, isn’t a flaw. I want a little combativeness in any President or CEO. But when it becomes the defining characteristic of who you are, fighting becomes dysfunctional. In the case of Donald Trump, I concede that my friends are entirely correct. He does fight. But, he fights everyone and everything, even himself. In pursuit of all this fighting he has been willing to demonize even casual opponents. He’s like the drunk who gets loaded and suddenly wants to take on everybody in the entire bar. I fail to see how this makes him an effective President. What it makes him is...a fighter.

As far as having the right enemies, even that is an odd selling point for a President. Do I like the press? That’s a trick question, right? Who likes the press?? Never has a profession grown so loathsome in such a short time than journalism! But is a free press my enemy? No. I might not like them, but I wouldn’t want to live in a country without a free press. Would you? Trump’s “enemy of the people” epitaph sounds like something a communist would say! 

“But Doug, he fights.” 

Yes. Yes he does. It has been the defining theme of his Presidency. Fighting. He fights the press. He fights the Democrats. He fights the Republicans. He fights his own advisors. He fights his cabinet. He fights the liberals. He would fight conservatives if there were any left. But, not surprisingly, all of this fighting hasn’t morphed its way into very much actual...policy. His famous wall remains unbuilt. Obamacare survives. Abortion is still the law of the land.

I give no President credit or blame for the economy because the economy is impossibly complex and largely immune to the small scale tinkering that most Presidents engage in. I also wouldn’t blame any President for a pandemic. Presidents don’t run local police departments, so their behavior is beyond any President’s control. But, I can’t help but think that this President’s fighting personality is now being reflected in the streets. Who, when looking at the chaos and violence in American cities, thinks that what we need as a nation is a President who fights?

I have not here made the case for his challenger. This blog isn’t about Joe Biden. This blog seeks to understand why our current President has made a virtue out of endless anger, resentment and confrontation, and why his supporters love him for it. For me, Donald Trump is exhausting. He promised winning. We got fighting.

Not the same thing.