AND WHERE IS WALDO?

     It is still fun sometimes to grab an old Waldo book and find him in the mass of lookalikes,dress alikes. We pore over the page, feel triumphant when we locate him, our job done, task accomplished. However, a big however, today we are not Waldos, we are not so easily located on the map, for how can others find us when we ourselves actually do not know where we are. In fact, the whole mess is complicated by the realization that not only do we not know where we are, we do not know who the hell we are anymore, losing all guideposts to our actions and locations. In fact, we are as one author stated, we are among "all those who have found themselves afield without a map."
     We are at sea, as the expression goes, in swamps, forests of dense minds, on polluted oceans and rivers, all waterways, and breathing air that only makes  us sick with its pollution, leaving us crippled and alone, lost, and where is Jack from Lost when you need him?
     We have just participated in history's worst farcial political event, leaving a man stained, stinking of his own refuse, incompetent and vicious, yet allowed to continue in office due to spineless Sentors of the GOP. Two, just two, had the courage of their convictions for a brief moment, while all the rest, most of whom admit that Trump's behavior was wrong, inappropriate - to say the least - yet, excused it all, even as more filth is being exposed about the man.
     Yet, we ignore it all and have committed the most dangerous act in all of American history, perhaps the very act that signals and begins the final act of the demise of Pax Americana, the strength of America as a democracy, an ideal and example to and for the world. Worse, we have done it all to ourselves, having sold our souls down the river, allowed a fakir, a cheat, an immoral misogynist, a sexual pervert, a fraud in so many ways, to rule - and I use that word rule with intent for oh Lord, what we have done.
     Headlines are now shouting he is "unshackled", given freedom to do anything he wishes, demean anyone he wishes, run rampant over our rights. Yes, that is indeed what we have done. We have taken not one step, but many thousands of steps toward the crowning, literally and/or figuratively, the first absolute monarch of America.
     Here are some words from an American icon, a man who loved his country, who understood the order of things and the danger that arises from its disorder.  “When you strike at a king,” Emerson famously said, “you must kill him.”We have all studied his words in classes, yet we ignore the future foretellling of that statement - much to our own danger.
      We did not "kill" the king. In fact, much worse, we have given him a new and larger crown, big enough to cover his ever growing ego, allowing for even more. Oh, yes, we are lost, afield, without a map. As for all the possible seekers, they are stuck up to their necks in the quicksand they themselves created and are going down fast, having abrogated their own rights and ours, in their zombie like lockstep following of this crude and cruel madman. The Demented One.
     The world is crumbling. A raging new virus runs rampant through the world, its numbers increasing at an exponential rate. Over 12,000 sick already and hundreds of deaths. A vaccine for it, you ask? Keep dreaming. Global efforts? Nah, what for? We have given up on globalism, trying to hermitize our own country and all others are following the same pockmarked road, all at our own risk.  We have allowed hatred and prejudice, along with ever increasing violence and murder, to flourish under the reign of the man who would be king and all his admireres and mentors.
     So what do we do? Do we all just plop down in defeat, giving up, calling it unstoppable, turning in our rights as American citizens, as members of the human race?  NO, most emphatically, no! We have come through other hard seemingly unfixable situations and together, we can do the same, replicate our victory over tyranny. Get out and vote. Donate to the candidate of the people, not of the oligarchs. Work the houses, the crowds and vote, vote, vote. Encourage others to vote. Get them to the polls. Get them absentee ballots and help them mail it. Be a pollwatcher and insure the rightful path of voting. Do whatever must be done if we are to rescue ourselves. 
     There is an old Japanese proverb which goes like this and it well behooves us to listen, to hear, to internalize and act upon it.
     "Fall down seven times, stand up eight." 
     We will get up and we will hear the words of another poet, this one of song.  
     "He not busy being born is busy dying."
                                Bob Dylan
    We need to rebirth ourselves, stop the death of America. The words say it all. The responsibility, the actions, the determination, the choice - all are ours. Let us get out there and defeat this horror in November and ensure that we last until then under his now horrific powers and twisted mind. It is the only way. Let us be the heroes of history rather than those who failed the generations to come - and our own selves.