ANXIETY REDUX

 My latest anxiety crash happened about a month ago, and I’m still a bit shaky from it. My handwriting looks like a penmanship earthquake. I’m in a bad mood all of the time. Fatigued. A bit wobbly on my feet. I try to remember the proverb from the Bible: “Weeping endureth for a night, but joy comes in the morning”. But the proverb doesn’t say how long the night lasts. Days? Weeks? Months? Years?

How about forever, which is what it feels like now. Except for a precious little calico cat name Luna, the night might feel permanent. I took Luna to babysit for a few days and ended up becoming her new mommy. She’s chubby, which is great for her greatest joy—rolling. She must hold a world record for rolling back and forth, stopping from time to time to lick her tummy. She pauses from time to time to see if I’m watching. I always am.

Fatigue goes with anxiety, which causes more anxiety. 

Looks like I’m locked in to a squirrel cage existence.

Poor me.

ANXIETY

 I have been binge watching an old television show called Monk, about a retired homicide detective who was asked to resign because of hiss obsessive-compulsive, germaphobic behavior, and his assistant Natalie. They are often asked to assist in homicide cases by Police Chief Detective Leland Stottlemeyer whenever a case gets too strange for normal police work. A witty and clever dramady. I’m not a good puzzle solver so I never see the denouement coming. I just enjoy the story. 

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It woke up this morning from a stress nightmare and have been fighting off stress all day. At 1545 hours I have taken several doses of anxiety pills. Now I’m drinking bourbon. I don’t understand why I have been suffering so much from anxiety for the past few months; it just kicks in. I hate it. I can smell it. It stinks. The smell only lasts for a few seconds, but it is always the same. 

I blame the poltergeist. Yes, I have a poltergeist. It knocks on doors and under the bed. The knock makes a sucking sound. It even knocked once when my husband was asleep next to me. Once it pushed up on the mattress so hard that I launched up several inches. This pissed me off so I kicked the mattress really hard with my heel. The poltergeist made a couple more knocks and left. Weeks or months later it tripped me on the deck while I was carrying my favorite flower pot and knocked the pot from my hand. Of course it broke. Now the poltergeist plagues my mind. I have been practicing mindfulness to gain peace of mind, and I think this angers the poltergeist. I’m locked in to a losing battle.

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I feed this birds. I have bluebirds, chickadees, house finches, sparrows, doves, cardinals, titmice, woodpeckers, robins, and grackles. I’m not happy about the grackles, but they never go away. Now the starlings are back. Speckled pests.The woodpecker is so damn cute. I call it Happy Bird because it makes me so happy to see it. It doesn’t stand; it crouches. It is so versatile it can eat from almost any position. 

Rachel the raccoon has been here for about as longs as I have lived here. Ruth has also joined us.  I feed them every night. Dog food. It’s spring and the girls are obviously feeding babies. They have baby boobies, and they are especially hungry. 

Sometimes I have gone for weeks so anxious or otherwise distracted that I forgot I had a car. (I have almost everything delivered.) Then the battery dies and I have to call USAA to come and start the car. Then I wonder how I could have made such a mistake. I’m old and forgetful, but forgetting that I should run my car engine from time to time seems unreal. 

It’s a bitch to be old and forgetful. It’s a bitch to have so little interest in food. Most food doesn’t even taste very good anymore. I’ve never craved sugary things, but now I’m attracted to sugar. Maybe that’s because I’m diabetic. I hate being diabetic.

Life is too hard, and it hurts too much.

Election Anxiety 2020

Tomorrow is the most anticipated and dreaded of election days in my memory. My stomach has not stopped clutching and heaving since Trump was elected four years ago. I knew he would be a bad president, but I could not imagine the horrors that he would commit in four short years. Historians for decades to come will struggle to explain how one stupid and evil man could destroy what intelligent, patriotic men worked so hard to establish more than two hundred years ago.

I am only one person, but I read about and hear about how others have reacted to the Trump presidency. They sound like me. Every day is a struggle to cope and endure.

I know that the most unfit person in America is president and is doing everything he can to destroy the good things that Barack Obama put in place. And that he installs incompetent, ignorant people to run important offices. They reduce their offices to pitiful shadows of what they should be. It’s like watching lines of dominoes fall into each other until they all lie flat on the floor.

Depression has taken over my survival instincts. I forget to eat. I forget to brush my teeth. Some days I take a shower; some days I don’t. This doesn’t bother me. I sleep for 10 to 12 hours a night. I have nightmares. Once recently I slept for 15 hours. I wake up in the mornings too depressed to move. I think I can’t get out of bed. But my cat Sally isn’t worried about Trump’s vile activities and she insists that I get up and feed her. I’m grateful for that. I do get up, for her, but then I slop around in my jammies for hours because I don’t have the energy to get dressed. Trump has sucked up all of my energy. Sally doesn’t care whether I get dressed or not. She just wants food and company. Eventually, shame forces me to get dressed. 

 I do my chores. I clean the litter boxes. I feed the birds that I so enjoy watching at my bird feeder. I feed the foxes that come out of the woods behind my house for a snack. I feed the raccoons that climb up on my second story deck to eat. They are so cute and such fun. The squirrels help themselves to everything they can find.

I agonize over the possibility that Trump could win a second term. I know I’m not alone. I watch Rachel Maddow reporting the latest shameful Republican activities and wonder how forty percent of Americans can support Donald Trump. My best guess is that they are willfully ignorant. It’s easier to be ignorant than honorable.

In the end, what will America’s epitaph read: Stupidity Won?

Or: Greed Won? 

Or: Putin Won?

I have already voted for Biden and Harris. I am 83 years old and worn out from four years of inexplicable evil. Voting is all I  can do to stop it.

 

TRUMP FAMILY BRAIN CELL

We are now in the fourth month of Donald Trump's lightning campaign to eradicate COVID-19 from  all America. Trump proudly points to the facts that there are only 2,032,633 cases now and only 136,000 deaths--the highest numbers of any country in the world. He lifts his Bible (upside down) and smirks into the camera to celebrate the results of his tireless efforts to Make America Great Again--while ducking all responsibility for thousands of deaths. 🙈🙉

Meanwhile, people insist on dying at an alarming rate and marching against an injustice that he barely notices. He retires to his bunker (only to inspect it) in case things might get tough for him some day and he might have to occupy it. What did he expect to find down there, Adolf Hitler? Saddam Hussein? Those two fellows didn't find much comfort in their hidey-holes. But of course they didn't have cell phones. Can a person Tweet from a concrete bunker, many feet below ground? Trumps shaky grip on sanity depends on it. 

In fairness, Trump has been functioning at a disadvantage. His daughter Ivanka has taken possession of the family brain cell to conduct complex negotiations  with the Chinese who are so vital to her fashion enterprises. She is a selfish young squirt, even with President Daddy, and refuses to hand it back to the Bumbler in Chief. But she promises to return it before the Republican Convention.

Those from the White House expected to attend the convention are:

     Donald J. Trump, who now claims that he is making a “transition to greatness.” 2016 redux
     Donald—I wanna be just like Daddy—Trump Jr.
     Eric Trump He’s not official; he just likes to play with the big kids.
     Ivanka, the Insipid, Kushner
     Jared—my blood is all white cells—Kushner
     William, the Balloon, Barr
     Mitch, Old Gravity Face, McConnell
     Steve. the Bottom Feeder, Miller
     Kellyanne Conner, whose mouth is the nemesis of truth

And Trump will hug the flag smirkily as he has done before. Some clever lady wrote on a social network that, “You’re supposed to salute the flag, not hump it.” Damn, I wish I’d said that. 👿



     

🙏

Vile is too Gentle a Term

Rachel Maddow has reported recently that the government’s Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA), which is supposed to represent the good guys, regularly steals N95 masks that states have ordered for themselves. Then last night she reported that FEMA has stolen a million masks from the Veterans Association. FEMA disputes these claims, which is to be expected. But I believe Rachel. She always does her homework.

Stealing medical equipment from states is vile; stealing from the VA is so egregious that vile is too gentle a term to describe it. Trump made certain, during the Vietnam War, that he would never become one of those veterans from whom he is stealing medical supplies. (Painful bone spurs that didn’t stop him from playing tennis, I’ve heard.) Now he has put states on notice that they are responsible for obtaining their own medical supplies during this pandemic, yet when they try to, as the VA did, the feds swoop in and take the supplies. Leadership by subterfuge.

An old song called “Hard Hearted Hannah” tells of a woman so mean that once she was seen pouring water on a drowning man. Same thing Trump is doing to the states.

I have faith that Trump and men like him will some day end up in hell. I have a fantasy that Trump will go to a worse place called Double Hell. In Double Hell Trump will always be in solitary confinement so that he will have no one to bitch at or make speeches to. He will occupy a small cell, about six feet by six feet, with no windows and no ventilation. It will be all steel with no chair and no bed. One twenty watt bulb will light his cell for six hours a day. He will be naked so that he can’t hide his eyes from his blubbery body. He will be fed the same food that the immigrants confined at our southern border are fed. His toilet will be a bucket in a corner and he will wipe his bum with sand paper.

And that is just Introductory Hell. In the next phase the floor will be mud and there will be fewer amenities. He will have to wear a dress and high heels. His head will be shaved.

It is said that everyone has a dark side. The train wreck Trump administration has brought mine to the surface. Not pretty, is it?

Cat With Attitude

My cat Sally stomped me awake at 5:30 this morning. Usually she waits until 6:00, but today she was especially anxious to get me to the bathroom where my duty lies in turning on the water in the shower stall for a few seconds so she can lick up the water on the floor. My son Doug finds this profoundly disgusting. Sally learned this behavior years ago from waiting for my husband to finish his morning shower then going in to lap up the leftovers. Sally has clean water in three different places in the house, so she is not desperate for a drink at any time.

After the morning drink she expects her breakfast to be served. Never mind that my aging body and mind are not half as quick to wake up and function as hers are. 

When I say that she stomped me awake, I mean exactly that. She is a little tuxedo cat weighing about seven pounds, so stomping doesn't seem like something she could do. But she has the big round paws of a highly successful hunter and has learned to pound me with them. She stomps across my body to let me know when I should get up. If I don't get up right away, she stomps me a second time. Then if I'm still too stupid to crawl out of bed, things get ugly. Blood might be spilled. My blood.

Other than that, she is a sweet, precious little cat who keeps me company and has been my saving companion since my husband died two years ago. She didn't understand my long absences when I visited him in hospitals and rehab facilities during his long and painful illness, but she didn't punish me for them. She was just happy to see me when I came home.
And I was just as happy to see her.

We have worked out a daily routine which revolves around her eating, playing, and sleeping schedule.

Did I say WE have worked out a schedule? Foolish me. Scheduling is her job. Mine is to read the signs and behave accordingly. 

NonTrumpeous

The coronavirus turns out to be the one thing in America that Donald Trump can't get away with calling a hoax, lying his way out of, or making go away just by calling it bad names and then ignoring it. It is here; it is in his face. No matter how much he squirms or tries to find someone else to take the blame, he has to  deal with it. He's doing a totally inadequate job of dealing with it.

His first idea was to appoint Mike Pence to be the head honcho in charge of taking care of the problem--most likely because he didn't want to take the blame himself when his administration inevitably failed to stop the coming pandemic.

Then he tried daily to blow smoke up everyone's skirt by telling us he has everything under control and things are looking good. He has to do this; he loves himself too much to admit defeat. 
Scientists, doctors, and gym teachers all agree that there is one thing the human body is absolutely unable to do: kiss one's own ass. And yet, Trump has proved them wrong time after time. Every time he has a tiny success or even a crashing failure, he takes to the airwaves and turns them into ass kissing triumphs. Kiss, kiss, kiss; smooch, smooch, smooch. All over his lardy ass.

He can wear his skinny lips raw doing this and lie until his tongue blisters, but he is never going to wipe his disastrous coronavirus response from his record. Nancy Pelosi said it best: "As Trump fiddles, people are dying." 

Is this what America looks like when it is Great Again?

Our Founding Fathers brilliantly provided for many government problems when they wrote the Constitution. And yet, they failed to foresee a time when a president was so incompetent and ignorant that even impeachment could not get him out of office. They failed to see a Senate and Senate majority leader whose soulless self interests would lead them to the purblind conclusion that what the president did was bad, but not bad enough. They failed to provide a solution to that problem.

I suggest an amendment to the Constitution that would correct that  omission and get America back to intelligent governance.

Amendment No. 28; Emergency Measures: The Federal Government shall provide, in the case of a president who has proved himself/herself to be dangerously incompetent, ignorant, and clueless, a closet assassin who shall, in the interest of protecting America and its Constitution, provide the services necessary to eliminate that person from the office of president.
This assassin shall operate free an clear of any punishment in the performance of his/her duties.

Run it up the flagpole.