Getting Ready for the Big One

Getting Ready for the Big One

After battling the war of the worlds of ants this summer, the weather seems to have broken to a more pleasant temperature zone with the lows overnight in the low 50’s and the highs reaching up to the low 80’s. That is now my kind of weather for a number of reasons. It used to be an issue of pure bodily comfort, but now I recognize it as an environment that is suboptimal to ants. The little cold-blooded buggers thrive when it is between 75-95 degrees and when it gets down to the low 50’s they go underground into their hives and do the ant version of hibernate. Also, as cold-blooded creatures, their agility and mobility is tremendously reduced in cooler temperatures. The bottom line is that I think I am down to killing only stray ants that are a little more robust than their average brethren. This makes for a much more pleasant environment altogether, having had the peak of our ant problem over the last several weeks, almost as though they were out for their last 2020 hurrah before knowing they had to go into hiding.

Yes, you know where I am going with this. I am likening Republicans, and more specifically that subset of Republicans that have been do-or-die Trump devotees, to cold-blooded and annoying ants that drive you crazy when they swarm, but are quickly forgotten when they return to their underground lairs. You know they are not gone, but you are less troubled by their right to exist than you are by their ability to destroy what you have built for a comfortable lifestyle by swarming on the scene and presuming to be the rulers of the animal kingdom. Shit, they are only ants after all. They can annoy you and they can bite you and make you lose your appetite. They can make you jump up and down shaking your limbs to try to get them off of you. But you are the master of your universe, the master of your fate. You know they operate on raw Darwinian instinct and not with either the cerebral strength or evolved compassion and ethos that motivates your life. But they do have a version of collectivism that can look and actually be impressive. Those small brains are actually quite efficient in getting the job done that needs to get done. And they are relentless. Reason does not work well with ants. Instinct is all they know and that is linked directly to survival at all costs. Tell them that their day is past and they still march on to the death. Block their way and they will work for generations to find a new way to that same goal. Ants will always be with us and I will go so far as to say that they are not only a part of life, but perhaps a necessary part of life. They remind us of our humanity and the need for us all to be less like them and more like the enlightened beings our species has the capacity to achieve.

We stand at a crossroads as often happens in life and in history. One of the best parts of the editorial ponderings of the current moment is that wise journalists have become more contemplative as the events of the moment get more and more severe and troubling. These are prophetic times and many people realize and appreciate the need to be more contemplative than normal. The value of the study of history is that it brings lessons and further enlightenment and never have we all been so easily able to review and contemplate our place in history and how our current predicaments compare to the similar moments faced in the past. Some would say that this moment is not so special based on history, but others would disagree. One of the most stark comments I have heard was from our aging but respected and wise journalist, Dan Rather. He said that he had lived through the Great Depression, WWII, the Cold War and Cuban Missile Crisis, the decade of assassinations (Jack, Martin and Bobby), the Oil Crisis and 9-11. They were all difficult moments that had their own dilemmas. But he said he has never witnessed a moment with so much at stake and so much uncertainty as the current moment. He conflated the events of a Global Pandemic and the current risk to Democracy as that dramatic do-or-die moment that would define the future of the human race more than any crises that he had ever lived through in his long time on this Earth.

We are certainly in a moment right now. We are 39 days from an election that seems to have more importance than any I have lived through (I have been voting in national elections since 1972 when I turned eighteen). The dramatic news of this moment is that we are currently governed by a man that did not win the majority four years ago, has had worse approval ratings than any modern president for the entirety of his tenure, has discarded more norms than any president in recent memory, has lied publicly to the American people to a point where no one takes anything he says as credible, and who very specifically and very openly declares that he will not necessarily agree to a peaceful transition of power if he loses the election as he chooses to define it. He has gone so far as to manipulate all of our means of having a free and honest electoral process, most notably by attacking that most venerable and longstanding of all public institutions, the U.S. Postal Service. He is openly declaring that the election outcome will be defined by himself as being true or false based entirely on whether it shows that he won or not. He has made a mockery of both the presidency and, more importantly, all three branches of government with his refusal to submit to the directives of Congress and by stacking the judiciary to favor his positions. This is tantamount and not overstated as a frontal attack of heretofore unseen and historic proportions on the the foundation of the democratic process. Am I overstating this? Not in the least.

This is the Big One we have all known in our heart of hearts was likely to come at some point. Fred Sanford (Redd Foxx) would always say, “I’m coming Elizabeth, it’s the BIG ONE!” Redd was all about hyperbole, even in his double lettered names. But the truth that underlay Fred’s heaven-sent declaration was that more American men died from heart attacks at that stage of history than any other killer. The Big One was always just around the corner for any of us and is still not so very far from our reality, even with the advancements of modern medicine.

It is time now for me to end this story of men and ants. The day is passing and I have my chores to do, including making calls for the Democrats of Move-On, in hopes that it will in some small way help move the needle. I will be teaching nine young and impressionable minds tonight in the start of my first graduate seminar (virtual) and I must get my game face on. But mostly, as I sit here in the warming morning sun I see that the ants are coming back alive and I must either run and hide from them or find a way to force them into permanent retreat. That may be the only way to make myself ready for the Big One.