Party politics

We have a party every year, on the night before Thanksgiving. It's not even a party, really, more of a get-together. Food and drinks and a fire bowl and music, and people coming and going, and most of us talking about how we can't believe that the holidays are upon us, and that soon enough, we'll be saying that we can't believe that it's summer already.

I have friends whose beliefs span the whole political spectrum, so if nothing else, then I guess that the conversation at this year's party might be a little more lively than usual. I'm wondering if I need to post "No Politics" signs around the house that night, just to keep things from getting out of hand.

My Trump-supporting friends voted for him either because they had such serious reservations about Hillary that they felt that they had no choice, or because the Democratic party is anathema to their pro-life beliefs.  I sympathize with their concerns about Hillary Clinton; and as a pro-life person, I also share their dislike of the Democratic party.  

HOWEVER:

1. The Republicans are no better. They controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House from 2001 to 2007, and what they accomplished on the abortion issue can be filed under N for not a damn thing.  They’ll have full control of the Executive and Legislative branches again beginning in January, making it put up or shut up time for the GOP.  Personally, I no longer believe that politics is the way to approach this (or most other issues), which is why I don’t worry much about party affiliation when I vote.  The idea of abortion as a human right is a monstrous lie, and unless we can change the culture and help people to see the truth about abortion, then no lawmaker or judge can make even the slightest difference.  What does make a difference is a genuine understanding of the dignity and worth of every single human life, and that makes it hard for me to understand how people believe that Donald Trump is the person to advance the cause, but I suppose we'll see.
2. Yes, friends who voted for Trump, I will concede that he has been gracious in victory.  I’ll also point out that it’s very very easy to be gracious in victory.  Graciousness in defeat is a whole other thing, and nothing that Mr. Trump has said or done suggests that he’s even remotely capable of losing with dignity.  I have no plans to demonstrate on the streets to protest the results of a fairly contested election.  Democracy is a bitch sometimes.  But please don’t make me laugh with ridiculous assertions that Trump supporters wouldn’t have done the exact same thing if he hadn’t won.  Trump would have cried like a big orange baby about rigged systems and biased liberal media, and angry Trump supporters would be demanding recounts and threatening revolt or civil war or worse.  Spare me.
3. The draining of the swamp appears to be underway.  News reports suggest that Trump’s cabinet picks will include Rudy Giuliani as Attorney General,  Newt Gingrich as Secretary of State, Sen. Jeff Sessions as Secretary of Defense, and a retired Goldman Sachs executive as Secretary of the Treasury.  Maybe the President-elect forgot to mention that he was planning to replace the swamp with a cesspool.  P.S. You keep saying "Blind Trust." I do not think that this means what you think it means.

ON THE OTHER HAND:

1. To anyone who has posted or shared the horrible meme of four or five former First Ladies in dignified and regal attire, juxtaposed with a nude shot of poor Melania Trump, which was probably taken under duress when she was 18 or 19 years old: Have the rules on “slut-shaming” changed?  Is it now OK to slut-shame, as long as the slut in question is affiliated with the wrong political party, or married to the wrong man?  Talk among yourselves and get back to me on that.  Meanwhile, if you share or post that meme or anything like it, for the purpose of shaming or degrading Melania Trump for her youthful indiscretions, then I will immediately recognize you for the misogynist that you are, and I will decline to take anything you say seriously, ever again.  
2. If you’re calling for Democrats and other Trump-resisters to treat Trump with exactly the same obstructionism and lack of respect that Republicans heaped on Barack Obama, then just stop it with the Michelle Obama “they go low and we go high” quotes.  That’s exactly the opposite of “going high.”
3. Not everyone who voted for Trump is a racist or a hateful hating hater filled with hatred. The "Love Trumps Hate" rhetoric is just silliness. And by the way, "hate" is a verb. It should be "Love Trumps Hatred." I get that the former sounds better. But it's just wrong.

See how fair that is? Three each. Now enough of the politics. It's party time.

I'll have the usual

Oh my gosh, what has happened to me?  Do you know what I did yesterday?  I bought scented pinecones (scented pinecones!) and a scented grapevine wreath.  And then I went to Michael's and bought a shitload of scrapbooking supplies.

Well, no, I didn't.  Not the scrapbooking stuff, anyway, because come on.  But I did buy the wreath and the pinecones.  Scented.  Orange/clove/cinnamon scented, to be exact. So now I have a bowl full of pinecones on my dining room table, and a rustic pile of tree branches nailed to my kitchen wall.  Bonus irony points: I can't even smell them anymore. What the hell?

*****

I almost never abandon a book once I start to read it, but I made an exception this week.  I started reading another book of ostensibly hilarious life observations by another funny blogger, and I gave up on it almost immediately. I can only take a limited number of jokes about menopause and spandex and the various physical infirmities and indignities of middle-age before I lose my patience.  And that limited number is apparently zero, because I didn't even finish page 2.

I'm reading Ship of Fools instead.  I've read Ship of Fools at least a dozen times, and it holds up very well after 50 or so years (not 50 years of me reading it because that would have made me quite the prodigy, but 50+ years since its publication.)  If you happen to be feeling a little too warmhearted and optimistic about humanity, then just read a few chapters of Ship of Fools; you'll get over it pretty quickly.  Katherine Anne Porter is just like Jane Austen; that is, if Jane Austen had hated everyone and everything.  But oddly enough, a few pages of Ship of Fools puts me in a much better frame of mind, because I don't know anyone as awful as the passengers of the Vera.

*****
If you'd prefer to get your jaundiced view of mankind in a movie theater, rather than a book, then consider seeing The Girl on the Train.  I'd complain about the way the movie portrays women (crazy/desperate/pathetic OR manipulative/sneaky/promiscuous) but the men come off so much worse (controlling/violent/predatory) that it's almost a feminist manifesto on film.   Anyway, it was very entertaining, and because I never (and I mean NEVER) watch or read psychological thrillers, I didn't really see the ending coming, although I suppose it should have been obvious even to an idiot.  Emily Blunt is such a marvelous actress that she makes even a sort of predictable (for smarter people than me) suspense thriller a great movie experience.

*****

So I never buy things like scented pinecones and grapevine wreaths, and I never go to mystery/thriller movies, and I never stop reading a book until I finish it, and I never vote early.  Except in this very unusual and extraordinary November, when I apparently do all of the above.  Who knows what I'll do next.  Maybe I'll join Pinterest.  Maybe I'll go to Disney World every year, and post a "days 'til my next Disney trip" countdown on Facebook.  Maybe I'll run a marathon.  Apparently, anything is possible.