March 13th will mark one year for me, the beginning of the year of the unusual not just for me but for the entire world

Yes, it has been a year of change all around. This year is quickly coming to an end on the calendar but not so much when it comes to the side-effects, confusion, misinformation, . There is an old saying, the more things change the more they stay the same.

Julius Caesar was warned, “Beware the ides of March.” No one warned us and maybe we, like Caesar, would have ignored the warning anyway. As it stands we e were lulled into a false sense of security. Who us, worry? We are America, the land of the free, the home of the brave. No foreign enemy has every set foot on American soil to wage war against against our democracy (9/11 notwithstanding). But, March 2020 came in like that proverbial Lion that continues to hold us at bay with its roar while we shelter in place and wonder when will it all end?

The changes have snatched the covers off a lot of things, stuff that had often been cloaked in intentional silence. But, in the heat of change, when those covers were ripped off, we startled onlookers looked out the window and immediately saw that the Emperor who walked among us was stark naked. Why had we not noticed his bare nakedness before?

Maybe we were stuck in some kind of mind matrix, comfortable in the assumption that the beat goes on and when the rhythm changes, it’s always to the good. Yeah, that’s where we were. Today, not so much.

The more things change…

The Pandemic demanded our attention, snatched us out of our comfortable comfort zones and threw us into a swirling vortex of “What now?” The cacophony of clashing political voices stopped us in our tracks. Neighbors and friends chose colors previously relegated to the Bloods and the Crips to became gangsters for their cause which they saw as a call to immediate action. They demanded that opposing voices shut up when they tried to speak up to out about the blatant injustice paraded under the guise of “Make America Great,” a statement that raised the question, “Make America Great for Whom.” Social media because the platforms where duels of words took place, the goal being to destroy credibility and undermine support. Fake news abounds, conspiracy theories thrive and instead of burning books, people gather to burn masks and decry the ignorance of the masked and hand sanitized.

The more things change…

Change ripped the covers off the undercover agents of white supremacy. The agents who had managed their “leanings” behind the corporate shield of eligibility and “we already have one,” and tentative pats on the head. The racial divide was always in place but suddenly those agents stripped themselves of their white collars to align themselves with their blue collar brethren wrapped in their 20th century confederate flags. They unified in this new manifest destiny of continued greatness to excoriate those who did not join in their lock-step demand that not only should America remain great, it should also remain supremely white controlled.

The more things change…

March 13th will mark one year for me, a year of change and self-evaluation. It has been a year of distress as I’ve watched the world evolve into planned chaos and no one seems to understand the power of unity for the well being of everyone. We live in our separate camps and give the side-eye to anyone who dares to cross over to offer a peace offering. We trust no one but those who mirror our reflection. No one will take the initiative to storm the Maginot Line of the mind. We shelter in place behind our closed doors. We hold tightly to what we believe is our right and we wrap ourselves in our self-constructed self-righteousness and the Emperor? He still has no clothes.

The more things change…