COMING ATTRACTIONS

 Yesterday, we finally had a chance to visit the movies, which I love. Strange movie. Not really quite sure of its genre. Or of it knowing its genre. Nor what message was meant to be conveyed. But still, I was at the movies. In any case, at least we remained awake and attentive. What I do like very much about movie going is the feature known as coming attractions. It gives one little vignettes, a trailer or two of new movies. They generally match subject matter and approach of the movie scheduled for running that day.

  Sometimes I think I like to come and get those coming attractions more than the movie itself.  Someone asked me to explain why. I did my best, but to make a long point short, this is simply the way I think and the way I am. I'm a person who likes to know, who likes to plan. I don't like to always have life in a state of unknowingness, a not knowing of what is on tap for the future - in whatever length of concern. A world is to be faced.  

Anything allowing me to prepare myself and to make some decisions as to whether I want to continue along this road or that, see that movie or this, whatever is out there, up front and catches my eye or mind. Maybe it's silly. But for me it is not and it is more conducive to my having some kind of a grip on life. Life has been, too often, especially in more recent years, quite concerning to me as it skipped in disorderly unpredictable manner from event to event, some good, but of late, many, too many of recent years, have unrolled and unveiled in bad, even tragic manner. Too many for which we were unprepared, unwilling to accept, but that is not a reality nor choice possible.   

  That wanting? No, not wanting - that needing - to know at least something about an upcoming event, drives me for it makes me feel more secure in an increasingly insecure world. Too often these days, from one day to the next, one does not know nor understand how and why things are proceeding the way they do. Even when we actually do know the answer we do not admit or acknowledge that for it is too abrasive to life to acknowledge as such.  

A glaring example of such is a horrifying reality of having a madman as president. Of this nation. Any  student of history simply watching him rant and rave or read about it as seen by witnesses in the White House or see him fumble and mumble and stumble via incoherent speech, or forget names of his own people, or wander along a red carpet, unable to walk a straight line, even as he cannot speak a straight line of truth, well, it is frightening to say the least. It is unnerving to a degree I, and in fact all, admit it or not, unknown ever before.

Yes. We've had presidents before, as other countries have also had leaders, who strayed off the straight and narrow. Who violated the ethics and principles of the nations they led. Who went awry too often for any within those nations to be sure and certain of good times ahead. But never before has the stress. and the source of the stress and the exacerbation of that stress been contained within one Being.  The stress and the stress itself are that Maniacal. Egotistical. Narcissistic. Deteriorating. Facsimile. Of a leader.  

 One can see within him and without, his streaks of madness shared with the worst, most homicidal and dangerous leaders of history. So manifestly in the wrong place at the wrong time. Simply the wrong being. Caligula. Hitler. The mad power crazed Dictators of the USSR. Khomeini. And the list goes on and on. The only difference is that he has not yet gotten around to the point of wholesale shooting of opponents rather than 'merely' targeting them for retribution of the worst kind, as bad as his sick mind can imagine. However, coming attraction:  The way he talks, the way he says things, that next step does not appear to be neither too far away nor improbable, as it should be. 

But how can this be? In the United States of America!? You do not kill opponents. One might even kill a career, but the targets are left in life, breathing, able to go on. Although Trump has ostensibly not gotten to that point, perhaps he has already. Those people shot on the street. Those people dragged off, beaten up. Abused and terrified. Well, maybe he has taken his introductory steps and more, into that level.

  The news that I read. The news that I hear. The commentary that I peruse. All are coming attractions. I am not truly very sure at this point, whether these coming attractions are beneficial. In advancing the knowledge and preparation as to what is coming, what he has driven out of his barn of horrors for us to undergo. Or if it is more harmful than beneficial. 

I hear both sides of that coin. But I think I come down on the side which states yes. Yes, Esther, you need to know. You need to be prepared. Need to be able to have time to think. To formulate an opinion. Even if that opinion counts for naught. However, in my case, that almost makes 'no never mind', for these expressions of my feelings and opinions are healing to me, allowing the anger to exit rather than remain inside, curdling my inner self to a point of no return.  That cannot be allowed.

However. there is another question. Is what I write about worth the time. Is it, so to speak, cost effective? Nobody asks me, at least openly, for my opinion and even if they do, so what? Who am I? Not Jean-Valjean, merely Esther, a simple citizen voicing worries and concerns. Wondering why none out there have seen what she has seen, or voicing worries and concerns. Wondering why no one out there has seen that which she has, seen and warned about, for years already. I saw those coming attractions and tried to act upon them; still continue to try, but is there any benefit to it? 

The truth is, I do not know nor do I care. My readership, thank you, tells me that there is a concern, there is an interest and so I continue to write. For them and for myself. Even as I open up a paper in the morning or hear a news broadcast, and SLAM! my hand down on whatever surface is nearby. And shout. I said this already. I said this months ago, years ago. Why didn't anybody ask me?  Who am I? I'm a nobody. So why would they even know to ask me? Additionally, sometimes what I say appears to be so improbable that they would look at me and recommend a 72 hour stay. But I am not nuts, am I? I predicted and shouted out about it all. The path that Trump would take. The divisiveness that would grow to almost overwhelming degree, seemingly, possibly, unable to be resolved, or at least paper it over, giving us a chance to build something solid beneath, able to carry us again as one nation. I don't know. But it is frustrating to say the least. For there are many, many people out there with a bigger brain and better pay grade than I, so where the hell have they been? Where are they now?

 An even bigger concern of mine, a fear of mine, is the ugliness of the fact of how many have chosen to go over to his side of the line. It matters not what the cause was, what the reason was. The end is all that matters - people willing, able, perhaps even eager to beat up a defenseless woman. Or an old man living in this country, "illegally", for twenty years, built a business, raised American children. Trump has pimped out himself, his ugliness of soul, his twisted thoughts and proposals. Unfortunately, there were found many willing to take advantage and participate and then boast about it, and swagger around in manner calculated to rival the strut of Hitler's SS and Khamani's religious police. Even when taken to task for their misdeeds, their actual murders, there spews forth a rotten rank stream of excuses and denials. Their souls and hearts must be as dark as Dante's 7th Circle of Hell.

So, do I like coming attractions? Do I appreciate them? No, I do not like them. Not in the least. I do not appreciate them either. However, they do in some way help me strengthen my legs. And my eyes and my heart and my soul to withstand the constant attacks that go on every day. Attacks that bruise and batter. I want to open the gates so as to overwhelm any and all proponents of the insanity that has overwhelmed not only our nation, but the vast majority of the entire globe as well. 

The question is, why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we find it so hard to maintain an even keel? Keep our oars in the water pulling us straight and true. I don't know; perhaps I expect too much. Perhaps rather than advance, mankind is doomed to operate in retrograde manner. Five steps back for every one step forward.

I wish I knew. I wish I had an answer for all the woes that have befallen us. For sure there are other things we would much rather do. No more useless words flying back through the air at us . Is the violence in Minneapolis that which we need to wake us up? Until we get riled to the very marrow of our bones before we react to the very blatant dismantling of our democracy? And why? How, in fact did it come to this point. How far back did we go wrong? When did we abdicate from all that is right. Excused of and from guardianship of our nation? Of the values of this nation. I don't know the answer to that either. We must know that we had better straighten ourselves before too long as the opportunity might no longer be there.

If we do not gather our rosebuds now, we will have no rosebuds left. No petals to throw at our opponents and convince them, peacefully, sanely, with words, to understand that their way is the wrong way, leading to disaster and failure. And seas and oceans of tears. Wherever and whatever we can manage, we had better do so quickly.

Perhaps. Maybe. Possibly. Hopefully. The truth is finally coming to the surface. Bursting through the thick layer of ugliness of lies and anger and hate. Perhaps our legislators will actually find their inner strength, and knowing what is right, will engage in doing what is right. Otherwise, the confrontations are going to grow larger, more vociferous, more violent. The patience of most of the populace has eroded down to the last very thin layer. Trump's approval polls are more like disapproval polls at this point in time and thank G-d for that. 

Pipe dreams? Coming attractions? The endings remain unknown. The great movie maker in the sky has left it to us to pick and choose, to create or destroy. Even as we are so manifestly abusing that privilege. Always to remember and heed the warning: when one abuses a privilege, one loses that privilege.

 It has been thus in all of our yesterdays.

It has become more of the reality of our todays.

And the coming attractions of our tomorrows are veering to the vile.    

Time to choose. Time to X the box. Time to circle the answer. Time to opt for one of the choices. And bear the consequences and the difficulties.   

Hopefully a positive choice from all, or most, will become a reality and we will avert a new Book which begins "And in the beginning..."