NY1: Election Day, Tuesday Nov 5

 Tues Nov 5, Election Day: Day 1, 2:30 pm

There are many ways to start a new year. January 1 is the start of our western calendar year. Chinese New Year fall later in January or February. For some, spring solstice signals a new year for the cycle of new growth and birth. July 4 is celebrated in the USA as the beginning of our nation. For students and teachers a new new begins in late August or early September. Easter in the spring celebrates a beginning for Christians but the Christian calendar starts anew every year at the beginning of Advent, about four weeks before Christmas, the birth of Jesus. 

When I pick up my log book to begin again after a long absence, it feels like the start of a new year.  I began many years ago to record our vacations.  Initially I started by writing a haiku to commemorate each day.  This week, on Sunday, November 3, Bill and I began what I refer to as a sabbatical, a time away from our regular routines, a time at the beach, a time for rest and reflection.  So it is time for me to pick up my pen again. (To see my vacation blog for this week, go to:  https://flowersandfeathers.blogspot.com/2024/11/orange-beach-nov-3-9.html

Today is election day. The choice for president presents the most stark contrast of personality, vision, character and competence in my lifetime. The outcome of today's vote will determine what kind of nation we want to be, what kind of nation we will become.  Polling has not produced a predicted winner. So it may seem counterintuitive to declare today to be the beginning of a new year.  In fact, I believe it may be days before the results are fully complete and we know who the next president will be.  And Trump will surely contest the results if he is not the winner. 

The next weeks and months may be turbulent.  It is not clear how our nation can be reconciled, one citizen to another. I believe that if Harris wins, the majority of those who cast their vote for Trump will shrug their shoulders and accept the result.  A loud and potentially violent minority may not.

But what is Trump wins.  Will we meekly fall into a Fascist disctatorship? Will we go the way of Humgary into an autocracy or keptocracy? Or are the fears of progressives exaggerated? 

Today is a watershed moment, but we don't know which way history will flow.

I believe that "my side" is right and the "other side" is wrong.  Of course! I don't believe my side is perfector or that the other side is evil.  I do believe that there is a "heart of darkness' guiding the other side; that relentless repetition of lies and "othering" have created great divisions among fellow citizens; that those who are providing guidance to this movement seek chaos/anarchy for their own benefit (although I don't know what that benefit might be). I believe that most of my fellow American, my brothers and sisters and friends and colleagues who cast their vote for Trump simply do not believe what he says out loud. Likely many do not have an apprciation of history. The MAGA movement has played on their fears, insecurities and selfishness.

I pray that we as a nation, individually and collectively, can hold on and hold together, that we can continue to bring into reality our national vision of e pluribus unum.