I really really needed this.

My Last post: Wed Nov 6, 2024, 06:28 AM

In it, I declared my state, which was that I was not ok. I was utterly broken, and I made the decision that, for my health and for my family, I needed to step WAY back away from politics. In that time, I remained aware of everything happening, kept up with the current state, attended the marches and protests, but I couldn't bring myself to feel right about my country until I saw the shred of hope that we saw tonight. Yes, the No Kings protests parts one and two were uplifting, and the hands-off protest and all the other stuff was amazing, but I needed to know that something other than a protest, where I knew 99% of the people who would be there probably aligned with me already.

Nope. I needed tonight to tell me that the change in the air is bigger and includes people than the usual crowd. That people just might be changing their thinking.

I feel like I am still fractured, that things will never be the same, but I also feel like I can move forward, and hopefully, the country can as well.

I have embarked on a long journey over the last year. I took up hobbies that I never thought I would, as some were counter to my previous stances. I have aligned with groups that I was previously closed off to or ignorant of. I have grown even in my older age and realized that if we are going to move forward, there are a lot of commonalities to explore and build bonds on. But there are people in this world who cannot be helped. They cannot be reasoned with and most importantly they cannot be allowed to steal my joy and to derail the only important thing I have found in the world which is making the days batter one day at a time, one interaction at a time and letting the haters and the ugliness fall by the wayside with as much significance as a breath in the wind.

We have to build the good. Tonight we have something to build on.