OCTOBER 22, 2019 – Ironically, my family’s retreat—our place away from it all—is in the middle of Trumpland, in far off rural America; “ironically,” because my wife and I can’t stand anything “Trump.” For three years, our morning routine has involved going out-loud ballistic over the latest headlines about a guy with no business being president. Make that, “a guy who has lots of business while being president.”
Amidst Trumpland, however, we find ample reminders that however bad we think the Trump presidency, much of the world is oblivious and impervious to a guy whose ignorance of the planet is tied to his lack of curiosity about it.
By “much of the world,” I mean rocks along the lakeshore; trees in autumnal splendor; squirrels stockpiling acorns for winter; loons treading water in front of our dock; our sun, slipping below the horizon, giving way to a star-and-moon dance over the lake—whether or not we notice . . . whether or not we’re even there to notice.
“Much of the world” includes our four-year old granddaughter, as she colors away inside, while outside an all-day rain soaks the earth. She, the rain, the earth—all are unknowing, uncaring about the rancor that reigns back home in “the city.”
With things to do, chores to complete “up at the lake” in Trumpland, our attention turns away from pants-on-fire lies, mass information, manipulative media, Orwellian rationalizations. All that shouts in anger dissipates from mind and emotion.
Well, almost.
For a moment here, a moment there, I recall what I shouldn’t. While I plant more pine seedlings, I think of times when America wasn’t actively undermined and sabotaged by its own president; when citizens weren’t so roiled about politics. That thought leads to another; that we’ve always raged at one another in one way or another.
My attention snaps back to the beautiful autumnal surroundings, “oblivious and impervious” to politics.
Not for long. A bad thought battles back. It reminds me that by agency and executive orders, Trump is reversing conservation measures adopted by his predecessors. I struggle to overcome that thought as I crouch to plant another seedling to fight climate change.
Not so fast, says another thought. In the end, it’s not the absence of rules and regulations that wreck the earth but we ourselves, with our insatiable appetites for consumption and resistance to restraints on our freedoms. Without our demand, there would be no supply of opportunity for those who exploit our demand. Just as 125 years ago, the lumber barons took control of this land and severed from it every single tree to feed the demand of . . . our forebears as they crowded other parts of the land.
I feel these thoughts driving me mad. I sink to the ground and cry tears of angst over a freshly planted seedling. But then I catch myself.
Perhaps, I think, my tears water hope upon this little tree, which in years to come will give hope back to me and the world.
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© 2019 Eric Nilsson
