Politics

Processing the Blue Wave

~ MaryG ~ 22 Comments

What a crazy time to be alive.

I’m happy, but wary. And also scared.

Scared

It’s like we really don’t know what he’s going to do. Trump is too stupid, arrogant, and insulated to acknowledge that he is WILDY unpopular and RUINED his political party (and much more) for the foreseeable future. In the White House, he lives in a bubble, lovingly attended by sycophants. And yet, he remains the most powerful man in all the realm—with access to nuclear weapons—for two more years.

Happy

I mean come ON…the blue TSUNAMI feels so good. After all the poster-making, protesting, singing, letter writing, donating, art making, posting, calling…we actually won. Grassroots organizing and VOTING beat the billionaires. Holy Shit.

Wary

OK, so I’m like 93.5% sure that MAGA Trumpism is on life support. But what is gonna come next? According to historians, huge defining moments of change and great progress have taken place at the end of eras like this (1850s, 1890s, 1930s). In the words of Heather Cox Richardson, “we have a chance to build something.” I so want this to be the dawn of a new age. I want my grandchildren to grow up in a better, kinder, safer, more affordable, less terrifying world.

I’m wary because I’ve already heard such wildly diverse viewpoints from people on my side. Even SNL came right out with a skit making fun of Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer for being way too mainstream to meet the moment. Will the right leaders emerge to lead us through the storm and into 2028 so we can get The White House into good, safe, smart hands? Will people stay engaged?

OK, so that’s ⬆️ where I’m at on the Sunday night following the Tuesday, November 3rd midterm elections of 2026.

FACEBOOK

In case you don’t know, Facebook is like Ground Zero for GenX politics. (Remember youngsters, GenX lost track of our classmates for decades between school and the invention of social media.) Facebook is where you rediscovered anyone you ever knew when you were much younger, and then found out which ones had drunk the MAGA Kool-Aid and which ones you would not need to unfriend.✂️

I went to bed early on Tuesday night. (I wasn’t going to get burned again watching heartbreaking election returns into the wee hours.) On Wednesday, I woke-up early and immediately saw that there had been a huge Blue Wave—I think they were even calling it a Blue Tsunami in the NYT. My Facebook feed was weirdly quiet though.

I did see one post from an old friend who rarely posts. It just said “YAY, VOTING!” Another rare-posting old friend just said “sending thoughts.” The most ardent activists I know posted nothing. I think they were stunned. Also, gloating seemed wrong.

I decided to post my recent abstract circular painting with the caption “I’m naming this painting Blue Wave 🌊 😊” on Facebook. It just felt right to post some art on Wednesday morning. It received many hearts and wonderful comments from FB friends who were feeling like me. I even got some likes from folks with whom I very rarely interact and didn’t know their political leanings.

Blue Wave, 2026, watercolor and ink

Breathe

NYT Stuffed Peppers

~ MaryG ~ 12 Comments

How do you define success in life?

My current definition of success (at age 61) is….I have no idea. The older I get, the less I seem to know.

My marriage has lasted 33+ years, which actually astonishes me sometimes. We are VERY different types of people. He cannot sit still, I cannot get off the couch. I like disco and yacht rock, he loves hardcore punk. I love to travel, he doesn’t feel the need. Thankfully we’ve always been on the same side of the political spectrum—from George HW Bush through the Orange Lame Duck (Duck à l’orange). In addition to politics, our common areas of interest include TV and movies, walking (hiking when we were younger) and of course our kids—and now grandkids.

He’s always been supportive of my hobbies (mainly music and art). I cannot even begin to tell you how BAD some of the singing has been at the amateur choral concerts I’ve dragged him to. And I try to be supportive of his healthier hobbies, particularly gardening. (I was not a huge fan of his more “extreme” endeavors like powerlifting.)

Anyway, yesterday I helped him trim his homegrown weed and he turned my latest still life subjects (colorful bell peppers) into a delicious dinner.

Success.

Cannabis kebab
NYT Stuffed Peppers

Recipe – really good! He used ground turkey (rather than ground beef) and it tasted great.

Hear me sing

~ MaryG ~ 19 Comments

What’s a song that changed your life?

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First, I want to thank Stephanie and Rojie for heeding my request to post a Vote Blue message for the midterms. Please read both of their posts, which are so heartfelt and powerful.

Second, I blogged about my performance of the song “Anthem” from the 1980s Broadway musical Chess at a cabaret night at my church last spring. In the show, it’s sung by a Soviet chess player who is thinking of defecting, but the song became newly meaningful to me in light of rising authoritarianism in my own country. These are the lyrics, with one change that I made:

No man, no madness
Though their sad power may prevail
Can possess, conquer, my country’s heart
They rise to fail

She is eternal
Long before nations’ lines were drawn
When no flags flew, when no armies stood
My land was born

And you ask me why I love her
Through wars, death, and despair
She is the constant, we, who don’t still care
And you wonder will I leave her
But how?

I cross over borders but I’m still there now

How can I leave her?
Where would I start?
Let man’s petty nations tear themselves apart
My land’s only borders lie around my heart

I’m not a professional singer, so I wasn’t gonna post the video, but in support of our imperiled democracy, here it is. I hope you can hear in my somewhat nervous voice how meaningful the song was/is to me:

Finally, please get to the polls and VOTE BLUE tomorrow. Let’s start to take our country back from this lawless administration.

And if you’re in Maine, Michigan, Iowa, Texas, Alaska, Ohio or Kansas please be sure to bring ten friends. Sometimes people just need a ride to the polls. That’s an easy way to make sure they vote.

Vote.org

“This (election) is not a choice between flavors of ice cream. This is a choice between ice cream and poison.” ~Heather Cox Richardson

Just another way he scammed you

~ MaryG ~ 9 Comments

What are your thoughts about cryptocurrency?

I’m not going to pretend to understand cryptocurrency, but I don’t need to because I have common sense.

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck.

Gift article from The NYT

“It is hard to wrap your head around that the president of the United States would engage in this level of self-enrichment at the expense of so many of his supporters,” said Lee Reiners, a former Federal Reserve Bank examiner who now studies cryptocurrency issues at Duke University. “This is a president of the United States who has made more money off crypto since he took office than he made in any prior year in his entire business career.”

Knock on Wood

~ MaryG ~ 14 Comments
How do they not get brain damage??
Pileated woodpecker image from Wikipedia

The President of the United States is a corrupt and treasonous criminal. He does not care about you – at all. His promise to send you $5,000 if his party wins the midterms is a lie. He is in the office only to stay out of jail and enrich himself and his family. On Tuesday, vote to save the country.

It may be too late, but we gotta try.

https://www.vote.org/

I sure would love to see every American WordPress blogger who agrees post a similar message for the midterms. These are not normal times. “I don’t do politics” is a bit of a cop out at this point.

It’s crockpot and voting season

~ MaryG ~ 10 Comments

It’s 28 degrees Fahrenheit at 7am here in eastern Massachusetts. The sun is just coming up.

Crockpot season has begun.

Last night was the second time my husband made this NYT recipe. It was better this time, because he dumped out the extra bacon fat before frying the mushrooms in it.

NYT Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore with Mushrooms and Bacon

It was my idea to serve it over polenta, which we happened to have on hand. It was excellent that way.

The US midterms are NINE days away. Americans should vote as if their lives depend on it, because they literally do. The current regime is wildly corrupt and incompetent in a way that defies comprehension. I believe the entire world is on the brink of a truly terrible time if it is not stopped.

Donald Trump should be impeached and tried for treason.

The latest on Iran.

Last chance

~ MaryG ~ 15 Comments

How do you manage stress?

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I don’t think it’s exaggeration to say that this midterm election is the last chance to save American democracy. We know for certain that our President and his acolytes plan to undermine it.

I hope this doesn’t seem performative, but I want my grandchildren to know which side I was on in 2026, and that I did in fact try to do something to fight back. So here are stacks of letters and postcards I wrote to voters in Ohio, Michigan and Texas, encouraging them to vote in the midterms. I’m going to mail them this week.

Democrats are far from perfect, but if you’re not getting out and voting blue in this midterm, you’re on the wrong side of history.

In the words of Yale historian Dr. Joanne Freeman, “If you are both sidesing this moment, you’ve already chosen a side.”

Read NYT gift article: Trump’s attempt to deport Ilhan Omar is another leap towards the abyss.

Kimmel

~ MaryG ~ 9 Comments

Which celebrity would you love to meet, and what would you talk about?

Nobody is highlighting the absolutely ludicrous, delusional, bloviating egomaniacism of the President of the United States quite like Jimmy Kimmel. The emperor has no clothes.

Long live Jimmy Kimmel.

Also, like the rest of America, I was sad to see Kimmel’s sidekick (and former parking lot security guard) Guillermo get sent home this week on Dancing with the Stars. He was a joy to watch. And so was his pregnant dance partner Whitney.

Solar ON

~ MaryG ~ 10 Comments

As of yesterday morning around 10am, our new solar panels are ON and doing their thing.

There’s an app that shows us exactly how much energy our panels are producing in real time.

Also, we voted. Our ballots are in the mail. Massachusetts had a record nine ballot questions this time, which is ridiculous. The single most ridiculous question was about repealing our wildly popular recreational marijuana law, which passed in 2016.

Hard NO on Question 8.

Almost time to harvest our homegrown weed