No matter who wins any election at any level, the following morning I face a day knowing that roughly 50% of the people I encounter may have supported or voted for an (R) party candidate.
UGH!
Of course, that does not only apply to one particular morning. It does, however, seem most poignant then.
Indeed, every morning, every day, I know it's true. Approximately fifty percent of every other driver on the road, every other person in the office, the store, the neighborhood, the park...
And too many of them are sure that what they believe is true is actually true, what they have been told is fact is actually fact, the dangers they have been told the country faces are actual dangers that the country actually faces. They don't want to hear what I have to say; they interpret my words as an attack on their reality, their truth, their lives.
They seem to be comfortable in their fear and loathing. Can they not imagine a world in which people don't scorn and fear other people? Can they not imagine a world in which others don't scorn and fear them? The vicious circle their perception creates seems to fuel them and drain them. They may bemoan that cycle when they sense it in their lives, but they seem to deny its root cause. Perhaps they are simply unaware.
And thus, from that morning after an election, the days of the year unfold. Occasionally, I witness a spark of understanding. Every once-in-a-while, someone near me makes the connection and begins to reject the perception of people, our country, and our world they were instructed to embrace, and the light of a better future breaks through for them. And us.
I celebrate and hold dear those moments. They let me continue to hope. Now if I could just convince each one of them to vote!