"If you were walking together and not paying attention you might end up talking to yourself...."
Strange days, Bubba.
Entering this latest partisan fray via social media is like shoveling fleas across a barnyard.
Whatever is happening, my response is….
I dissent.
None of this actually surprises me. This is the inevitable result of getting down and dirty and staying there. And being dumb. Do not underestimate the being dumb part.
So now some insignificant little shit has divided us even further, somehow crawling onto an unguarded roof to become the latest 2024 Wikipedia entry. Nobody knows anything. All the questions that can’t be easily answered become fresh conspiracy theories. America more and more looks like some whacked out banana republic, unable to walk, govern, and chew gum at the same time. Nobody expects anything good to happen anymore. The better angels of our nature have fucked off and left us to our own devices. Suddenly the venerated Secret Service look like Keystone Cops. Our hallowed institutions are in sorry need of some fresh paint and a good power-wash.
It’s death by 1000 cuts.
Our days this summer are spent running to and from air-conditioned rooms, or dodging falling trees while waiting for yesterday’s power to be restored. There’s something about these brutal stretches of weather that turns us even more snappish than usual. Having our lives threatened by the national weather service on a daily basis gets really old after a while. In the midst of all this comes a smorgasbord of headlines. The Supreme Court this or that. Project 2025. Dementia. Vice Presidents. Hillbilly Elegies. Conventions. Snow in Philadelphia. We’re still not even sure who’s gonna be on the ballot come November. I’m feeling like I need to be re-booted.
But still the gears grind. There are other things to attend to. In a way more important things.
We laid my cousin Ted Loftus to rest Monday morning. Hundreds showed up in the searing heat to pay their respects. Everybody with a Ted story had a twinkle in their eye. That meant lots of twinkles.
Two of his children gave a funny, touching eulogy that drew laughter and tears at the same time. Afterwards, home alone, I was thinking to myself what I would say about Ted, and I started writing an ad-hoc eulogy in my own head…..
“I was thinking about movies. And how long they are. Ninety minutes minimum. Two hours + is the norm. But now in out streaming world, we can do multiple hour long episodes. So the story doesn’t need to be truncated anymore. We can pull on it like a rubber band. Maybe at first Ted’s story would be a Godfather length movie. Three + hours. Then maybe a sequel. But no, not enough. Ted would deserve the multiple Netflix episode treatment. Maybe 8 to 10, all dropped at once so you could binge-watch. And then at the end of season 1, there would surely be a clamor for more. So Ted would get another season. Perhaps filled with flashbacks. And then maybe a 3rd season, branching out to the lives he touched. Such would be the stories to tell, and the characters to develop. So yea, my cousin was a walking, talking, multiple season Netflix show, and he would have delivered monster ratings….”
The admittedly stream of consciousness attempt was not nearly as good as the one his son and daughter delivered, but I tried. Ted was the kind of person that positively crackled with energy. He was unapologetically himself. If he saw something interesting out of the corner of his left eye, he’d turn left. If you were walking together with him and not paying attention you might end up talking to yourself. He loved his friends and family fiercely. He had a heart as big as a watermelon. And if he sometimes appeared to be running around in circles…..well….happiness can sometimes prove elusive. But he never stopped moving.
During the service all the nation’s background noise went away. The crazy memes and the ridiculous comment section arguments between partisans. There was no flag waving or cultist devotion. Those doors were closed. The church was filled with a feast of friends, saying their quiet goodbyes to a man who made a difference in more lives that even he could have imagined. Ted was a Dunmore legend while he was still alive. Try that in a small town, Bubba.
Godspeed cousin.
In a bit…
—tf
I was gonna say you hit it on the head with the banana republic comment. I actually think they, the corporations, want that. After that...you drove it home. Good one Tom!