CARE: Correspondences for American Resistance and Endurance

Let’s say there’s a nuclear warhead launched right at the heart of your hometown. The best you can hope for is making it far enough away from the epicenter that you are able to survive. 

But survival is a constant uphill battle on multiple fronts.

There’s the nuclear fallout to contend with. The inevitable radiation sickness. Food shortages. No electricity or communications. And the list goes on.

But you’ve also got stuff to do, right? For one thing, you need to return that new television you just bought. It’s a piece of garbage, and you want your money back. You’re entitled to it. 

So you haul the TV out to your SUV, and you head downtown to Best Buy. It’s easy enough getting there. After all, everyone else is going the other way. Not you, though. You’re on your personal holy mission, and nothing is going to stop you.

By the time you arrive, though, looting is well underway. If there was anyone around to help you out, they’re long gone. So now you’re out your refund and you’ve got a few extra miles of intense traffic congestion that’ll put you closer to the blast zone.

Good job.

This scenario sounds more than a little ridiculous, and it is. But it’s also where we’re at right now with far too many aspects of our lives. 

We aren’t prioritizing and strategizing. Many of us are treating what is happening to our government as just another thing we have to deal with. That’s not what’s going on, though. This whatever you want to call it – coup, Russian invasion from within, corporate takeover, etc … – is about to blow up in our faces and dictate what we do with our lives. 

Here’s what I mean.

Imagine you’re working for the IRS or NOAA or in education or the forestry service or any other number of fields impacted by Orange Julius and his deranged gallery of rogues. And you’ve got beef with management. Every day, you get half an hour for lunch, and you’ve been fighting tooth and nail for an extra 15 minutes. 

What makes sense right now – at this very moment – as the best way to spend your energy? Keep pushing for that extra 15 minutes of lunch, or work to ensure that you a) still have a job next week and b) that it’s the job you were hired to do? 

Look, I’m all for that 45 minute lunch or whatever, but the time comes when we have to stop and ask ourselves if it’s the time and place for the battles we’re picking? Especially when so many others do not have the luxury of picking their own battles. Thousands and thousands of dedicated employees have had their battles picked for them over the past month or so. God knows how many immigrants and assumed immigrants have had their battles picked for them. And the list will be even longer tomorrow.

What’s the story you want to tell 20 years from now (fingers crossed)? 

Option 1: “Gather ‘round, children, and I’ll tell you of the time I wasn’t happy to just have a lunch break, so I kept pushing for 15 more minutes while my job changed completely and good friends and colleagues were fired around me. Also, our lunches were cut back to 10 minutes.” 

Option 2: “Gather ‘round, children, and I’ll tell you of the time I put aside a bit of inconvenience so I could push back against terrible things that threatened countless people. It was hard and scary, but we got through.”

Before Jan. 20, there were plenty of things to dwell on that frustrated me. And those things are still there, but I’m not dwelling on them. I can’t. There’s just too much to be pissed off and bitter about. And I don’t want to be consumed by that bitterness.

I was told something about 30 years ago that I took to heart. It was a co-worker when I worked at Kinney Drugs who said it. We had a huge shipment of stuff to put out, and most of the staff had decided they’d stick around for an extra half hour to get a jump on it. I said I wasn’t interested in staying because I wanted to get home and hang out with friends. 

“When do you work next,” she said.

“First thing tomorrow morning,” I said.

“So you’re cool with doing all of this stuff tomorrow, instead of sticking around and helping out people who want to help you out?”

I got what she was saying, and I agreed to stay. As we walked into the backroom, she said, “Sometimes you gotta eat a little shit so you don’t have to eat a lot of shit later.”

That’s where we’re at now. Are we going to eat a little shit now so we don’t have to eat more later, or are we going to be fussy over small inconveniences and pitch a fit while everything crumbles around us?

SONG: The Times They Are A-Changin’ by Odetta
And you better start swimmin’
Or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’

POETRY: Move by Alicia Ostriker
Whether it’s a turtle who drags herself
Slowly to the sandlot, where she digs
The sandy nest she was born to dig
Read More

RESIST!: Dr. Seuss