THRESHOLDS

  Threshold is a term that can indicate positivity or negativity. It demands evaluations of situations, proposals, and deep understanding of where these thresholds lead us. Most of us do not realize when we have reached a threshold nor when we have crossed one, a situation much to our detriment. Many of us neither realize nor care if that threshold, easily crossed by them, is dangerous to others. Certainly not in the new and proliferating 'Wild West' scenario we have going on now all over the world.

Here is a scenario most of us do not understand because it means nothing to us. Crossing a threshold in a room, anywhere, happens gazillion times a day without much concern, care or preparation. On the other hand, I, personally, have had thresholds become an important part of my life. I cannot cross them without care and concern, without watchfulness, or should I say mindfulness as to the peril they pose for me and so many others.

Crossing thresholds demands that one lift one's foot over it or be confident of balance if stepping on one. Neuro - degenerative diseases imperil that sense of equanimity taken for granted by so many, including myself, until I met an otherwise situation. I have had to teach myself a new strategy, a new awareness, and allow for the flow of my life to continue. Will my accommodations meet with permanent success? I certainly hope so, but one never knows what life hands out to us, nor do we have much say in that at all.

There are thresholds that are other than physical. They are emotional, mental, and of vast importance to the nation all the way down and up to multi nations and to small groups and individuals. Think of the thresholds of life today.

We are at the threshold of war - again - believe it or not. We are playing dangerous games of chicken. All it takes is one step of a selfish, unthinking - or perhaps thinking, actually - person to set off that tripping threshold footstep and there ya' go! Ukraine. Kazakhstan. North Korea and its crazed leader. Putin and his megalomania. Trump and his deleterious effect on Americans today, with no end in sight as millions cross the threshold to an insanity of denial of reality.

Congress, for example, both Houses, have crossed the threshold into a kindergarten atmosphere which dominates all. There are tantrums. There are tears, crocodile and real. There is insane posturing and a 'nah, nah, ne nah nah' attitude, shameful enough in children, but absolutely disgraceful, unacceptable and dangerous when carried out by supposed adults. Any day now I would not be surprised by one who stands up on the floor with thumbs in ears, wiggling fingers, and a darting, extended tongue. Such is the threshold  crossed in our most eminent legislative body in the nation. Along with the more local legislatures who are actually contemplating or have already crossed back over a threshold that leads to a repressive and oppressive state of affairs and an  autocratic government. 

Rand Paul boasts of how useful misinformation is and how he used it. Mazal Tov on joining the ranks of self-admitted cheats. Trump pulls one of his tantrums and walks out on an interview that is not pleasing to him. Run away. run away, such a mature behavior! A threshold of dangerous idiocy and insensitivity to the needs of others. Worse is the fact that so many, too many, have crossed that threshold along with him, boding an ill wind for us indeed.

Cruz is pushing a case that will just about make it legal for one to bribe a legislator, or future legislator. The conservative dominated Court which has already indicted crossings of thresholds of sanity and morality, will most probably agree. Woe upon us that we have returned to such immoral behavior. Woe to us that this return has flourished. Anti-choice people take to violence and repression. Anti-vaxxers endanger others, a much larger group, pushing the need for mandates with teeth. Big banks are now telling their unvaccinated they "will  not be paid not to work" as they stay home. The biggest shame, the worst threshold crossed? The attempts, growing quite successfully, creating dangerous thresholds that should never have been recalled into existence, denying voting rights, making it nigh unto impossible for too many to vote, and certainly a moronic path.

Repression and oppression do not end. It feeds upon itself and when self-consumed, it latches and leeches onto others. No one is safe. Not even the supposed leaders for nothing stands in the way of a repetitive cycle of governments toppled, mostly via violence and criminal behavior. 

Not even G-d is immune to the consequences of threshold crossings. Religion has returned in full gear as a battlefield question. Is America a 'Christian' nation, allergic to other religions? Are we going to return to the awful edicts of the Middle Ages, all the way to today, where religions other than the majority are to be hounded to death, via methods both literal and figurative? Are we to ban all religions in an autocracy? Are we to criminalize faith or no faith, whenever and wherever it suits us? Are we to allow some faiths or sects to impose their lifestyle on us? Over we go? And who trips?Permanently and immutably.

We are told that re COVID "the tide will turn ...  "We may be on the threshold of that right now."   A good threshold to cross, but what about the one crossed by hordes of dangerous, uncaring, unthinking riders of alternative vehicles who go nuts on the roadways? " "... the pack has been known to careen down sidewalks, clog roadways, drive at break-neck speeds, even intentionally veer the wrong way on roads. Called Wheels Up, Guns Down," Particularly, for some warped reason on Martin Luther King Day. Open season on pedestrians and other motorists? Open season for insanity, for criminal behavior? Where have we gone, what thresholds are left to cross before it is too late, the path back to sanity and comity erased behind us, no Hansel or Gretel leaving crumbs or stones behind.

We need help. We need reformation of thinking. We need to take down some thresholds and repair others, even, perhaps meet a need for new ones. We need a return into a room of sanity, need to cross that threshold immediately. However, are we able to do so or are there, will there, continue to be, too many opposed to that return to sanity, to unity, to America? I sure as hell am not too optimistic at this point. We are tripping too often as we cross thresholds, good and bad. 

As one grandchild used to say when little, "No I amn't." Well, no, I amn't either.