I lived through two terms of George W Bush. My obsessive news consumption began then. I found that if I was talking to someone who had the same view as I did I could babble and rant. I could be sloppy. We finished each other's sentences. But if I was talking with someone with a different view I wanted to be clear and informed. All the television, radio, Internet, Sunday New York Times I consumed were an attempt to learn and gain perspective.
In the Bay Area there weren't many people who didn't have the same view. We vented. We made fun of his inability to articulate. I hated him.
That hatred pales in comparison to what I have felt for the last three years.
I don't like hating. It is an emotion I feel a need to push away from. There are people who have hurt me. I don't feel any compunction about saying I hate them. It just isn't very deep. It doesn't have roots. It's like the first flame from a match. All big and sparking and then smaller, softer and ... gone.
There is hate that I can tap into from old and deep injury but I neither try to go there nor avoid it. It comes up. I feel it. I move on.
I understand that hate is human.
I don't like it.
I have made (and continue to make) every effort not to hear or see the president. I do hear and see him. I watch much less news but I do watch some. I listen to some. I listen to Podcasts. Facebook. Twitter. He's there. The smallest amount of him ignites such hatred in me. I don't want him to have that much of me.
These days hate feels like it lives just under my skin. I do not like it. I am safe in my lovely little nest with a bunch of books and food and streams of art and music and so much. And I see people on Oak street. No masks. Not looking like they're related. I feel judgy. Suspicious.
I don't really know them. I don't really think they need a mask on a street where there are no others. Do I?
We have neighbors for whom their condo is a second home. We don't see them often. These days they're here on the weekend. Hood River has asked people to stay away but I guess they feel it doesn't mean them. I have never had any feelings about these people. Now. I hate them. I feel worried about being in the elevator with them. I wear a mask to take out the trash.
I.
Don't.
Want.
These.
Feelings.
There's a story about a monk who meditated in the mountains for years. He felt so peaceful. He assumed he had attained enlightenment. As he walked into a village he stubbed his toes on a beggar's bowl. He was filled with rage and began to kick the beggar. I've always liked that story. I feel like we are reactive. We can maybe change or mediate how we react but I'm not sure how much. Fear and uncertainty are prickly. We become agitated for no obvious reason.
I keep thinking back on the week before things started shutting down. My friend and I were getting ready to get in the pool. The class before us is mostly older women as well. We know most of them. We all laugh and tease. One of them was practicing elbow bumping. My friend walked up to her and pulled her into a hug. We all laughed. We weren't going to get carried away with fear. We were much too grounded for that. We had common sense. And. You know. We live in a very small city in a gorge. There were a few cases in Portland, which felt really far away then.
Oregon has done a great job of keeping things under control. Hood River has four cases. All were mild. None needed hospitalization.
I'm afraid of my mail.
I hate this.