This place, America, is mess. It’s ridiculous and embarrassing. At least when it comes to politics, we’re immature, short-sighted, attention-span-deficient, ignorant, and self-righteously arrogant. This description applies generally to both sides. All sides.
No matter how much we may personally protest and say “I’m not like that”, we are all part of the steaming hot pile of illness and dysfunction that is US right now.
This morning was a good example. I don’t hide my contempt for cable news channels (all of them) , but in order to stay aware of what they’re reporting, I tune in to each (yep- even that one) for several minutes each week. Today, I heard a CNN interview with someone from the Trump administration.
It started out ok, but by the end it had devolved into something not much better than two teenagers trying to out argue each other using their over-inflated sense of wit.
Both sides cherry-picked, told half truths, exaggerated, distorted, and ignored the other side’s points.
Each side, probably thought they scored a point for their team.
Millions of people probably listened to that interview, gained nothing of value, and confused it as strength of conviction.
And our mess remains.
So where do the baby goats come in?
I heard that interview on my way to visit the Pennsylvania Farm Show. While I was there, I spent about an hour and a half in the baby goat area, where you can literally hang out with the kids (pun intended) as long as you want; feeding them hay, petting them, and snuggling with them if they let you pick them up. It was so nice!
As I looked around the crowded goat pen with its mazes of visitors and goat playground structures, I saw people talking to each other as humans.
True, most of the discussion was about the goats, but not all of it. I overheard small talk between strangers that evolved into concern and a desire to understand. This is what healthy humans do.
There were all sorts of people in the goat pen. Some who probably would agree with me on issues of the day and others who seemed like they probably wouldn’t. But it didn’t matter. The goats made it not matter.
They reminded us of something we have in common, a connection to the earth and to each other. They gave us a chance to show that we remember how to interact with other living beings. How can you approach things from a place of anger or anxiety when you’re surrounded by baby goats?
I know this is really oversimplifying an important and complex situation, but say you were tasked with solving a problem and you could use two people to help you. Would you choose people whose vibe matches the CNN interview? Or would you grab two people out of the baby goat pen and get to work?
I know, I know. Everyone is probably hating the lack of hate in this line of thinking. But no matter how wrong or screwed up the other side is, we cannot bash them into oblivion. It’s tempting and even satisfying to try, but in the end, it just isn’t going to work.
We’re stuck with each other. The whole big, immature, short-sighted, attention-span-deficient, ignorant, and self- righteously arrogant lot of us.
And the longer it takes us the worse everything gets.
Five O'Clock Shadow 