i have noticed when a year starts and it is particularly rocky, the year tends to be pretty good. the start of 2005 was really rough, health wise mostly but it ended up being one of my best years in school and personally. 2008 started horribly, for my family and for my health (i spent months both unemployed and sick on the couch) but as jeremy pointed out to me this past weekend, that very well might be the year that as most significant thus far in defining my reputation at work. so here i am 19 days in to 2011 and in the first two weeks, i've had my car broken into, had all my writing stolen (as well as my empty glasses case and a half pack of gum) and have come down with what i assume has to be the plague but is apparently just the flu. if the flu means feeling like a zombie for 5 days while still trying to engage in anyway, coughing, fever and aches, i would seriously advise against catching it. i'm assuming i caught it as a result of driving 40 miles without a window in 10 degree weather. on the brightside, i feel like i have been properly hazed by the city of detroit: i've had the police called on me, i've been hit on by more random strangers than i can count and now my car has been broken into. perfect. anyway, i choose to be cautiously optimistic that something will happen this year that will have a profound impact on my life, just because it happens to be the pattern.
i have been thinking quite a bit lately about the state of our country, which i think is hard not to think about after what happened a couple weeks ago in tuscon. it is a truly horrifying thing to have happen and for so many innocent people to lose their lives because of this man who is crazy. the problem i see is that i don't believe that he is an isolated crazy person. for a while, i was thinking that the tea party wasn't the worst thing that could happen because mostly they were a bunch of mostly illiterate, intolerant white people who were just going to hold up ignorant signs declaring their world views while taking votes away from the republican base in the midterm elections and call it a day. i knew we were in for more problems when some of those tea party idiots started getting elected.
i just read today that the governor of alabama said: "Anybody here today who has not accepted jesus christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother." he said this at his inauguration and i am almost literally at a loss for words. i can't understand what staff person read that over and thought "yeah that's a good line, please say that. i'm sure no one will get pissed off" or worse that the staff and governor agreed that this sentiment was acceptable. then there is the governor of ohio that issued a proclamation on monday that ohio would recognize dr. martin luther king jr day on march 17th. oops, probably should have double checked on the month before having that printed out. when i read about that, there was a whole part of the article that discussed how that governor picked an almost entirely white cabinet. fantastic. nothing like watching things go backwards instead of forward. i suppose on the bright side, in michigan we don't have a governor that is trying impose his religion on us or neglect a tremendous civil rights leader. we just have a guy without a clue.
i have had people ask me before when i was going to out grow being a democrat and it seems to be now as clearly as ever that will never be the case. because what america looks like today isn't what america is supposed to be. it is kind of horrifyingly disappointing what we've allowed to happen. anyone else remember that speaker of the house oompa loompa is trying to repeal the health care reform because....does anyone know why? i assume it's because it pisses him off. i heard something about it being a job killer but i'm pretty sure that's just republican talk for "scare the general population into doing what we want because this method worked in 2004 when we got into this...wait, almost took responsibility for something. dodged that bullet." i really wish i could understand this juvenile desire to make policy decisions based on what is inevitably going to piss off the senate and the white house. grow up, please.
my dearest dems, this is our time to get our shit together and come back in 2012. seriously, we have too much to lose if we keep electing idiots who are content on driving america backwards. (jumping off my soap box now)
anyway, it seems to me that america is supposed to have so much promise, so much going for us. can we get back to working on that and stop with the violence, bickering and general sarah palin-ing that's going on? we'd all be in a better place i think.
from the girl who turned "sarah palin" into a verb.
until next time...
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