ALL THINGS GREAT AND SMALL

   That is a title from an excellent book written by a British vet, but is also so apropos of life these days. Great events, small events, personal, local, national, international, all separate, yet all somehow linked together.
      Take tonite. At approximately 12:45, in the midst of an apparently active dream, I pushed away from something, or someone, and woke up flying through the air, landing on my back. Oof! It hurt.  A small thing as life goes, certainly not of great import to the world, but certainly to me. Not only does this mean weeks of aches and soreness in the back and, once again, down my left side, but it also highlighted the deteriorating condition of my life, physically anyway. The fall was one thing. The getting up was another. Between the two of us, it took a good 20 minutes for me to figure out how to maneuver, and to ignore the pain. Not great, but perhaps I need to be grateful for the small things in life. Nothing broken - I think - just bruising and aches and pains, bad enough. But I guess it could have been worse.
     On the other hand, things are generally broken here, locally, in the Village, particularly with UCO, the administration of this Village. Evidently. the President of UCO has decided to take his behavioral cues from the greatly demented, divisive, destructive and evil man, Trump and behave accordingly.
     Using the excuse of the virus, he has shut down UCO. Delegate Assemblies where decisions are voted upon, have been canceled since March. Please note that there is room aplenty in the theater for a delegate only socially distanced meeting to take place. In addition, many committee meetings have also either been canceled or held in a room where again, there is room for social distancing, but limited to members only, the same old tired coterie of sycophants who rubberstamp all David asks for. The rest of the Village, well, apparently they do not matter. This man, who portrays himself as a techie, boasts about it, apparently never heard of ZOOM which allows so many to join in and participate. Perhaps he needs to realize he is out of date and the Village needs a replacement, one more capable of seeing us through the next few difficult years.
    In the meanwhile, no  one knows what is going on. There are issues with the neighboring huge plot of land. There is great deterioration in the roads and walkways. There is a left hanging issue with the audits, the auditor, including access to papers necessary for the Treasurer to do his job. What monies are being spent? How about the next budget? There are questions re security and vast lengths of the perimeter left unfenced, open for "guests" to arrive unexpectedly. There are questions re planting that was supposed to have been done along some fencing. Huge worries re a new agreement with WPRF and the Levy family, as the prior one is expiring in a year. We were truly shafted in that one and it appears that we are on the same path for this one as apparently nothing is happening on our side to prepare.
     So what we have here is government by one man and his groveling, sniveling yes men. The same tired retreads for the most part, the same majority who prevent any progress or change in this now closed system, wherein one cannot even get into the UCO office - which we paid for - unless we have an appointment and try to get that if you are not a 'favored' individual, or one who has difficult questions needing difficult answers.
      Government by fiat, by dictation, by the same thinking that belongs to the Executive Orders of Trump, that would be dictator, that  example of a fascist dictator if ever we saw one, particularly here in America. So all those 'little' Republican members of both Houses are now wondering how to rein in this man. Why wonder? They have reaped what they have sowed with their enabling, their cowardice, their moral vacuum, and now, now, they are troubled! What did they think would happen?
     What has happened is that this man and his cohorts have destroyed the fabric of this country, ripped apart the web of checks and balances and spun their own evil web. A web of constitutional violations. A web of racism, anti Semitism, sexism, all things vile and poisonous. Nothing great here. Nothing small here, other than the remnants of a man's heart and soul, for he has long ago sold them.
      Power is the goal. The retention of that power the guiding principle. The destruction of our democracy ever more apparent as now he is  rudely, crudely and cleverly, tampering with the USPS, having it both ways. If he loses, well, it was fraud by the post office and those scheming Democrats, so no, he will not leave.
     On the other hand, there is the great possibility that via his tampering with the ability of the Post Office to do its job, by starving it of funds, by appointing a shill who does his bidding, as head, well, once again  he will be the illegitimate president and forget about this country. No more. Instead we will have a country divided into the haves, the have nots, the raping of our lands, our waters and the very air we breathe. Environmental protection goes down the tubes, medical oversight, scientific guidance, freedom, free press, equality in housing and jobs, education - all gone bye-bye. Simple-just limit the mail-in ballots - which he himself uses - and there ya' go!
     The results? The fall of the greatest country this world has known. The return to a Civil War II, a great and bloody war that will cost so many lives, cause great harm to the world as well, as blood runs in the streets, simply enlarging the clashes that are taking place now between protesters and extreme right wingers. There will be no stopping this destruction. The people of this nation are that angry, frightened, confused, and needing to release all those pent up negative energies and there ya' go again. A divided America. A destroyed America. The death of a dream.
     Yes, life is composed of things great and small and if we ignore the small, the larger things come into play and finally we have the greatness that arrives. It is up to us to insure that the great things are positive, helpful, instructive, and insuring that we survive as The United States of America. If we do not - no one else will. Now contemplate that and decide on your next step, great or small. As we used to shout - "The whole world is watching!"