Living in coronavirusworld 201 : the day after

 

11/4

Count the votes\\\\\\

                                               

As our underground gathers, there is a consistent sense of shock that so many of our fellow Americans, one out of two, actually want four more years of this. It’s very hard to fathom. Or accept. But no matter the final outcome, this much  is already true.

On the Tonight Show, Jimmy Fallon said that it’s like waking up with a hangover and realizing you still in the bar. 

anything to help Michigan and Pennsylvania

I have no idea what hat and shirt to wear for today’s gathering. So decide to go with something to add support for Michigan and Pennsylvania to go for Biden. My shirt is from my visit to Tiger Stadium in 2014 in Detroit. It was Polish night, so I got a Polski Tiger fan t-shirt. The hat spins off of that. It’s a 1947 Pittsburgh Pirate hat. Only worn that year. That was the year Hank Greenberg, the Hebrew Hammer, after spending his entire career in Detroit, came to Pittsburgh. They moved the left field fence in 30 feet ostensibly to give Hank a shot at beating Babe Ruth’s record 60 home tuns. Then called it the Greenberg Gardens.  A year later, when Ralph Kiner took over for Hank, they called it Kiner’s Corner, which would ultimately become the  name of Kiner’s radio show as a New York Mets announcer. My neighbor Barney Greengrass would laws take his iconic sturgeon out to Yankee Stadium for Hank when the Tigers were  town. Because Hank was a landsman, and because he hated the Yankees. Giants fan all thew way. The now San Francisco Giants still visit Barney’s after World Series victories. Anyways, we use what we can to up the mojo.

Steve H..and more of us, confessing to feeling helpless. Last Sunday a Trump caravan of trucks with blaring loudspeakers disrupted his service. Sam speaks of, and most of us agree, a feeling of shame. To be an American. Some even want to disassociate, saying it  always this way from the start with a constitution designed to protect slavery. (And thus the electoral college which hamstrings us today) But I can’t go there. Our constitution, like a work of art, has ideas more powerful  than the weakness of the men that created it. Martin Luther King, Jr always spoke to the cognitive dissonance between the words and the  reality. And I recall Abraham Joshua Heschel’s thought  that a prophet comes from a people and speaks to that people. With the strongest motivation of love. We are of this people and  share in the collective guilt and responsibility. By disassociation, we lose the capacity to speak prophetically to the people. 

And we need to know whee our ultimate loyalty is. As someone said, If I am not his, I am not. 

Russ wants to go immediately to what’s our job. Sam speaks of the importance of community organizing. We all agree, either Trump or Biden will win, but our deepest problems remain. Dre calls us to focus on what is possible. 

We know this as well: the virus is not going away. That will continue to be our context. 

Trump has announced that he is no longer a Presbyterian. He Is now a non-denominational Christian. (More votes there)

There are many ideas as to what we need or do. We need to recall God’s contingent promise to Abraham under the requirement to be a blessing to all people. To have purpose gives us forward movement. We need to talk less about rights and more about responsibilities. To challenge the question what’s in it for me? To create a community that acts in support of individuals and itself. 

My friend Jeremy relates how his parents debated waiting until after the revolution to have a cool so that  would grow up in batter world. They grew tired of waiting. 

Joel  cautions us to not leap into action too quickly. We need to live  with this. Grieve at what has been lost. Allow ourselves to reflect on it. And allow the path to emerge.

Joel talks abut how Trump has debased meaning itself. Words do not even mean the same thing  to the two sides. How do we even talk to one another?

Who are we as a people? How do we connect with our people? 

This is hard.  

Russ quotes fro the song, O Happy Day: He taught me how to watch, fight and pray, fight and pray, And live…

                                                  Oh Happy Day

I meet my rabbi friend for coffee.  It’s a beautiful sunny day. And we are both dealing with the shocking truth of our country. We are forgetting appointments. He takes a break to teach.  I finally realize it’s my granddaughter’s birthday and join in the ZOOM. I remember being there in Berlin  when she was born,. Over a year since I’ve seen her.  They can’t come here. We aren’t allowed there. 

on Lennox

ATLAH

I walk. Take in the leftover signs of Black Lives Matter protests. See the sign at the ATLAH  (All the land anointed holy)church. This Black Nationalist homophobic entity declaring Obama and Kamala to not be black, in fact be “covert white supremacists. What strange bedfellows for Trump, whose support froth black community actually grew this election.

I stay up late again. Unable to sleep. And we still don’t know.