Wringing one’s hands isn’t gonna do it this time

A dear, wise and cherished friend asked me why I will not be marching on inauguration day. I gave her a too long, too mushy response. While all true, I never quite got to the heart of what would keep me back. This morning, Roger Cohen’s NY Times article did:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/05/opinion/the-rage-of-2016.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=image&module=opinion-c-col-right-region&region=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region&_r=0

This pithy excerpt offers a shorthand to my reasoning, which is - as so many decisions are - based on fear: “It’s open season for anyone’s inner bigot. Violence is in the air, awaiting a spark.” We have seen random acts of everything. We have no defense against those, any more than we can protect ourselves from organized acts of everything, no matter who heads the coyly named Department of Homeland Security. As if there could be such a thing.

Cohen’s article is glaringly alarming in toto:
“…millions and millions of [voters] whom did not want — and will resist — the global nationalist and authoritarian lurch. They will do so on the streets, in the courts, via the press and through the checks and balances the framers of the Constitution created precisely to rein in a demagogue. Still, Mr. Trump has enormous powers, a Republican-controlled Congress and a mission to make America great again, whatever that means or takes.”

A side-truth in Cohen’s litany of scary truths:
“The impact of the smartphone on the human psyche is as yet scarcely understood; its addictiveness is treacherous and can be the enemy of thought.”

And most pointedly, perhaps:
“The liberal elites’ arrogance and ignorance has been astounding. ”

He got my number: I am astoundingly ignorant. I flaunt my arrogance. Hog-tied, yet holding on to my righteousness as if I believed that a god in heaven will restore sanity, or contrive a new one.

Read the whole article. Read it and weep. I have no skills that enable me to dredge forth analysis that will soothe and comfort, and move us forward in a healthy way. But I know a mirror when I’m looking in one, even if I don’t want to recognize this particular image of myself. And I know that smashing that mirror won’t wash the mud off my face or help me spit polish my outsides or my psyche.

My problem is, as aware of the scourge as I might be, I don’t know which cream to reach for, or which masseuse will rub away the ugly truth buried deep in tissue, or the location of a spa where I can get away from it all.

By whatever name we choose to call it, and in whatever guise it assumes, it’s here.

For the moment, this is my march.