A Beautiful Spring day

...but so much more

It was a beautiful Spring day. That time of year, when the lilacs are leaving the stage, just before the peonies come into bloom. Intermittent rain showers make the air feel fresh and clean, and the grass is so lush it needs a mow.

And on that beautiful Spring day, I had two conversations I would not ordinarily have. The first was with a man and his partner who haul and dump unwanted stuff for clients who find him on Craigslist. The next was with a woman who runs a storage facility in Des Moines.

What’s your take on the economy today? I asked.

The man with the flatbed stopped shook his head, and said he’s never been so busy. It used to be; he’d be hired to come and empty an apartment of someone being evicted. Now, he’s asked to clear out an entire complex.

“I don’t know where these people are going,” he said. “It’s rough out there.”

I put the same question to the manager of a storage facility. It’s a booming business, and she has just one unit left to rent.

The economy? She sees all kinds of clients, but she’s deeply troubled by a segment of the population that needs help.

“I have one man, sweet as can be,” she said. “All of his possessions are in a unit. He’s homeless. He knows he can’t stay here overnight, so he leaves. He doesn’t drink or do drugs but has mental issues, so he can’t hold a job.”

It was a beautiful Spring day, and another mass shooting took place, and the template for these nightmarish occasions got pulled out of the file. Thoughts and prayers. Blah, blah, blah.

After watching Biden’s address to the nation, I switched to Fox to see if they would cover the news that little children were slaughtered by a weapon of mass destruction, easily purchased by an 18-year-old in Texas. Do I say ‘allegedly’ here? Tucker Carlson lambasted Biden for not talking about the children who died. That’s what Biden did talk about, from the depth of the hole left in his heart by his personal losses.

It’s a beautiful Spring day.

A troubled young man or woman cannot get in to see a psychiatrist. There is a six-month waiting list. Or, a parent tries desperately to get help for her son, who is off his medication, and she can’t get through the outpatient phone tree. She leaves messages daily, but her calls are not returned. Or, another psychotic patient can’t get his monthly injection on time because of an ‘insurance snafu.’ These are folks who have loving advocates. There’s another entire population of the mentally ill who have no one. Not a soul who cares.

But they can buy a gun to mow down children in an elementary school, folks shopping at a grocery store, attending Bible study, Temple, a movie theater, or, or, or. And so can just about anyone, regardless of a ‘mental health issue.’

The gun is the common denominator.

This epidemic feels like trying to avoid the deadly Covid virus before the vaccine was available. In our bubble of privilege, we were masked, vaccinated, boosted, washed our hands, ordered groceries online, sprayed everything with Lysol, and still. Still.

Still. Will we be next?

It is so damned hard for people to understand the disconnect between jobs that go begging while people can’t pay rent. We see the world through our lens of experience, not understanding the complex issues that bring us to this point.

But as the guy with the flatbed said, many people are wealthier than they’ve ever been, but there are more people on the bottom than there have ever been. I suspect he does not follow the stock market closely. He follows the people market. The cost of inflation due to price gouging, business consolidation, and the greed that can buy a member of Congress is a threat to your/our life itself.

I remember a beautiful Fall day. The air was just about crisp, but not quite. I’d talked to a group of business folks in Winchester, VA (long story, not relevant). Driving home to Annapolis, my usual route would take me through Washington, D.C. But on that day cars were streaming out of the city. Mine was one of the few driving toward it.

Local radio stations were reporting our country was under attack. Planes had crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon (just a few miles from where I was right that second).

Will I be next? Many of us thought on that gorgeous Fall day.

I am reminded of a dialogue from the masterful television series ‘West Wing.’ There is a flashback to a time when President Bartlett is a student in the school where his father is headmaster, a mean sonofabitch. The father’s secretary tries to enlist young Jeb Bartlet to go to bat for the women who work at the school whose wages are less than their male colleagues. He, too, is terrified of his father and doesn’t want to get involved. When she asks him for help, this is their exchange:

Jed: I'm not a woman and I don't work here.
Mrs. Landingham: The women who do are afraid for their jobs. If they bring it up, they're afraid for their jobs. What is it you're afraid of?
Jed: Why do you talk to me like this?
Mrs. Landingham: Because you never had a big sister and you need one. Look at you. You're a boy king. You're a foot smarter than the smartest kids in the class. You're blessed with inspiration. You must know this by now, you must have sensed it. Look, if you think we're wrong, if you think Mr. Hopkins should honestly get paid more than Mrs. Chadwick, then I respect that. But if you think we're right, and you won't speak up 'cause you can't be bothered, then, God, Jed, I don't even want to know you.

There is a primary election in Iowa on June 7 and a general election on November 8, 2022.

If you are one of the 80-90% of the country who believes we need stricter gun laws but do not get involved in electing candidates who will do something about these issues of life and death, then I don’t even want to know you.

Click: WHERE TO VOTE

Who is next?