Them Changes

The above is the name of a Buddy Miles song lamenting a lost love, but I'm going to appropriate it for a small announcement: I'm changing the direction of these Civic Duty columns.

In the main, they have been mostly articulate – I hope – semi-rants about Donald Trump. I thought it was my civic duty to go after him hammer and tongs every chance I got.

I don't think I have to do that right now. His daily performances speak for themselves. If people can't judge for themselves what a monster he is, I realistically feel that incessant bitching on my part isn't really going to help anything. 

I have come to the slow realization that what is needed in these times are words of hope and encouragement, not anger and irrationality. They must be honest and compassionate words. Andrew Cuomo is my shining example. A tearful Rachel Maddow is another. They are everywhere: the lady next door who offered me toilet paper (funny and touching at once), the people across the way who fly Trump flags, but came across to help the woman on my other side get her husband inside when he got back from the hospital again (not coronavirus), my ex-wife Suze's many calming and almost therapeutic posts on FB. Many others; we all have seen or heard them. Listen to them and be glad for them. 

I'm almost embarrassed about the string of angry comments I let loose yesterday, spurred by Trump's terrible bullying treatment of Peter Alexander. They served no purpose other than hopefully to make me feel better – which they certainly didn't, thus these lame mea culpas. 

It also dawned on me yesterday as it hadn't before that this is just the beginning of this long and painful journey and if I'm freaking out every five minutes now, what am I going to be like in six months? I have to admit there is an element of mental self-preservation here. I needed it. Probably still do.

There are uncounted, unsung heroes out there: every person actually working face to face with the public in every essential job; every health care worker who's putting their lives on the line on a minute to minute basis, despite the full knowledge that supplies are short or nonexistent and that the worst of this has hardly begun; every parent who is trying to make ends meet while still being a true parent to frightened and confused children.

There are so many heroes. Let us sing them. How about this? Every day many of us are witness to acts of heroism large and small. Tell us about them. Share them here if you want. Post away. Make us feel good about each other in a way that Trump's daily blasphemies can never do.

We are in for a long and dangerous journey into the light again.  Help dispel the darkness. Tell us good stories of good people. There will be many. They will be endless. We need to hear them.