So many things…too many things that are beyond my control…and my tears fall, and my heart breaks and I sit here, my head in my hands, begging for answers from the angels. Why is this happening?  What can I do? How can I help? More to the point…. can I help at all???? Even just a little bit….?

I could go to my studio and turn the music up LOUD and try to divert my own attention…but somehow, I feel that I owe, at least, my tears. If it were just one thing, maybe…but this convergence of horrible is just overwhelming this morning.

I do know what to do and how to get through all of this….and I understand that time heals all wounds…though I think that the word “heal” is an overstatement. I need to turn my head and give my attention to things that feel better than this. I need to call my mother and hear her voice.  I need to take a walk…watch the sunrise…hug someone for as long as they’ll let me…tightly.  Yesterday it was a bunch of rhetoric…more of it. And it sounded like background noise that would eventually just go away. Today, not so much. People died, again, and it feels like things will never be the same. Justifications being thrown around so none of the blame sticks where they don’t want it to stick…but I saw it…all of it. And I know who they are.

I’ve been there, protesting. I’ve been there since I was a young girl. Signs in my hands and my voice as loud as I could make it. I’ve stomped my feet and held my clenched fist in the air and felt like I was part of a solution to make the world better…at least from where I stood. I have fought the good fight and used the freedoms guaranteed to me by those that have given their lives to protect it…And now look.  I felt safe, before. I knew that I had the right to say what I wanted to say. I could attend any rally I wanted to attend, with or without a sign…and I’d be safe there.  Not today. Today, I could be injured or killed by a group of people that don’t want me to disagree with them. And if I voiced my opposition, I’d be kicked out…shut down…and silenced.  Before, I could have a bumper sticker on my car or a sign in my yard, and no one would vandalize my car or my yard…. not today. My tears fall because I’m a coward, today. I feel like hiding…silent. Pathetic. Afraid. Is this how they have gotten so strong? Because people like me grow silent and afraid?

Before, I could bring my children with me, and show them that civil disobedience is the only way, sometimes…that to change things, we must be willing to fight for those things…because they don’t change themselves….CIVIL disobedience. Not this war, playing out before our very eyes. This is not what our founders meant.  Today, I would hide them and shield them from what I have seen…today, the rules are forever changed, it seems. Is this how the world is now? God, it can’t be. Today I grieve for all of us

What has happened to love and respect and kindness??? I know that it lives in me, still. Does it live in you? Can I trust again? Can I believe again? Yes! I must.  We all have to.  If we don’t, if we allow them to silence us, the only voice that the world would hear are those that are filled with hatred and disillusioned by conspiracy. And that’s not good enough. Not for me. We all have a hand in the change we must live to see. We must raise our children to be nice, to share, to be kind, to be fair, to be respectful…We have to be the example, verbally and in our actions…. because our children are watching our every move. They will be like us when they have the wheel. I have to believe that kindness and love will prevail. Love thy neighbor…thou shall not kill!!!!

Let me begin this day, again. I know that good thoughts bring more good thoughts. And bad thoughts…well, you know.  I’ll dry my tears and get on with it.  I’ll seek, today, the warmth of the sun and pray that it takes away this evil chill, living on the fray. I’ll begin again…by counting my blessings.  We are healthy, and safe in our home. Those are two of the greatest blessings…right off the bat! Let’s look for the good in people. It’s the only way we will find it. Let the light of love shine in us all. This, too, shall pass.  It must.