How I’m Choosing Who to Vote For

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

This past weekend Daren & I went to Harvard for Freshman Family weekend and attended the Keynote address: “The Polarization of America: Can We Bridge the Divide?” with IOP Fellow and former Congressman from Nevada, The Hon. Joseph J. Heck.

I didn’t know the name, but found the talk to be something I can really chew on. Before anyone starts to look Heck up, and bash or celebrate any move he ever made; Heck is Republican and obviously putting his neck on the line by speaking in a highly liberal environment – not only for the parents last weekend, but through many lectures for students during the year.

I don’t like to discuss politics and often do not speak freely as to which party I’m more aligned with, but I’m not a Republican. Most of the audience was not either. However, the talk was wonderful and touched on many reasons why the political divide is kind of inevitable but not impossible to overcome.

One part of it really hit home for me and is something I plan to always consider as well as one can. That is the gumption of a candidate. Heck didn’t even use the word gumption, but at times and once during the Q&A he said something to the affect of considering individuals who can stick to their morals well enough to say No to power.

We need to generally hear an individual’s viewpoint on important issues whether it’s equal rights, gun control, the right to choose, immigration, etc. However, even more so it is important to consider whether or not the individual has the ability to work with others (even others on the other side) to come up with solutions that find common ground, andto have the gumption not to flip in order to please power, keep friends, take money, or even just to wrap up a session and go home.

Candidates need to have an answer on hot topics, but it doesn’t mean they are so ridiculous about it that they will no longer adhere to common sense. Party lines and rigid yes/no answers on issues make it nearly impossible to be seen or understood as something in between. Additionally, few topics are so black or white. The topics and national problems that are on the table took years to get to. They just cannot disappear overnight. It’s tricky stuff.

Take gun rights for example. Me personally – I don’t “believe” in guns. When I hear a candidate is a ‘gun person’ I look to their opponent. But in reality a candidate has to answer yes or no if they believe in ‘gun rights’, and that doesn’t answer a whole lot unless you really hear from them or look into their background.

But what does gun rights really mean? A part of me understands the other side. Just because I mightnot have one, I’m not sure I should or even want to have the right to tell someone else what they can or cannot have. If we outlawed them tomorrow what would that solve? People will still have and use them, likely often as much as they do now. We don’t have the money or man power to go into everyone’s homes to remove them. People are not going to turn them in because they are illegal. Drugs, prostitution, child porn and human trafficking are illegal but that doesn’t stop those who want to do these things from doing them. How can anyone tell a 19-year old minority single mother living in a shady neighborhood that she needs to give up her legally owned gun that makes her feel safe so she can shiver and be anxious walking down the block when she had previously felt safe, secure and that she had some power over her life? She wouldn’t be voting on my side even though she has a very rational point.

What I would love for our politicians to do is look for common ground and not give in to nonsense that power & bullying will try to instill. They need gumption to do that.

I have not a single statistic in front of me but would be willing to bet that most people in either party do not want to see one more mass shooting- like EVER. Guns are a part of the issue – of course. But does any majority really, really believe in the right to have a semi-automatic gun or weapons of mass destruction as part of no constitutional restrictions? Are any liberals really trying to take away any and all power to bear arms? Maybe some people fall into these categories, but again – I’d be willing to bet it’s a small percentage. Those persons in that small percent are not the individuals I would like to elect to pass our laws. The individuals I would like to represent my vote would have common sense and not give in to power or bullying of a smaller percent.

How can a healthy minded, willing Democrat work with a healthy minded, willing Republican to come up with potential solutions about how to prevent what we all want to prevent? We have to be willing to compromise, understand one another’s view and create a solution with them that works for all. There are many issues I don’t agree with 100% but understand the other side. It’s not easy and/or black and white.

This is where we the people come in. We do our due diligence and look for the truth in the people we have the power to elect. We understand and look past silly time limits during debates, simple colors to show which party the candidate is aligned with, and the one-liners on all these hundreds (and I mean HUNDREDS) of political signs all over the place.

My first reaction to what I just wrote if I wasn’t writing it would be some defense about “Who has time for this?” But I need to even question my own silly gut reaction. Because if not this, then what actually matters? Isn’t this our right? Our ancestors fought hard for this power and we take it for granted, bemoaning that we don’t have time and just hope, wish and pray that the right people will be elected. Or we just vote down the party line and ignore the alarm signal that someone might not be looking out for the majority or have common sense.

So get involved! Even if it’s too late – at least do a quick google search before voting tomorrow. But do vote. And vote for someone with GUMPTION and common sense. We have the power. Only when you believe you don’t you actually don’t.

 

If you enjoyed my writing, consider leaving a comment, sharing with others, or following my blog

https://esterinaanderson.com

On the Tangled web we weave 

Posted on by Esterina Francesca




Where to begin?

Daren and I have been in Africa for the past week. We started out in South Africa and are currently in Zimbabwe. The economic disparity between the first world and third world is almost inconceivable. The modern day effects of corruption and apartheid are prevalent with just a glance out the window. How can such an atrocity be in the year 2017?

It’s so complicated. We have been having conversations with one another, friends, and locals about this very topic for the past week. I think we were both surprised how much the lower paid locals know about the US political system and have critically considered how to remedy an ugly situation created by our ancestors and governments. There isn’t an easy answer.
What has also surprised me is seeing first hand what South Africa looks like today and reading older media materials about their apartheid. From a brief glance, the population of mixed race was not enraged or agitated about one another; it seemed to be something the government was enforcing. Many citizens were recorded to have said even though apartheid laws were on the table, they didn’t think they would be passed. Then when they were, they thought in this modern day there is no way that can be enforced. Until people of non-white descent were suddenly removed from their homes. That was not but 50-70 years ago. AFTER WWII and all we learned as a human race. The same thing happened here in Zimbabwe but on this end the whites were forced off the land.

Then interestingly enough, I heard an entirely different perspective from the “white” side. We have some friends from the states that have been living out this way for the past 9 months who have met all types of locals. They have friends of Dutch descent that presented a point I had not considered. In essence the passed along viewpoint is that if we are forced to live together with two different viewpoints for living, it can make for an ugly situation. For example- if one party doesn’t believe in taxes, schooling, and maintaining the land and the other does; the party that doesn’t only makes it more difficult for the party that does. From their Northern European perspective, apartheid was meant to separate folks by their beliefs. They say when their ancestors arrived no one was on the land, they didn’t push anyone out (disclaimer, I don’t know the specific facts of the Dutch settlers particularly in SA, and we all know that it did happen in many other places). A few hundred years later, the cultural beliefs were still clashing. For instance, the Dutch wanted their schools one way, and other groups wanted it another way. So instead of trying to mix and mash when one party won’t have a conversation with the other about it, they felt it might be best to live apart and do what each party would both like in separate camps. So apartheid laws appeared. Since it was the European settlers who built the infrastructure and cities, they felt they had the right to keep that part and the others could have the land the way they found it when their ancestors were there.

Wow… on the smallest scale within my own home, having a blended family I completely understand how trying to mix two backgrounds in a living situation is practically impossible. And in my family we are almost completely similar in color, believes, religion, education; not to mention a really small group of people. How can you mix communities, countries and cultures that have hundreds of years of history ingrained into their being and ask people to get along and work together? I do know apartheid wasn’t the answer. As I know Daren and I setting up separate homes or rules within our family wasn’t the answer either.

The answer is that there is no easy answer. Some might point to education, but education doesn’t make you smarter or right about how living in the world should look like. What is wrong with living in a hut and dancing around in the bush? Is the ultimate goal to keep building and making things to make human kind’s life easier? What is wrong with just loving life, living with the land and passing away when and how the universe decides? Is spending your life looking for a cure to make someone else’s life better someday so noble that you don’t appreciate what is around you in your own life? Does that make you a better or more important person? If you believe that, does it give that person the authority to make decisions for others that don’t believe that?

Let’s not forget about the people that were enslaved, killed, and removed from their land. This is still happening in 2017. What about those who were freed? How can their groups catch up and make a living and have the basics like food shelter and clothing when the commonly accepted mechanism to get a job is education. You need money for the basics. You need even more money for an education. You need a job for these. No job = no basics and education. No education = no job. A rather circular problem that one can’t escape. Their culture before enslavement didn’t require this, but they are forced to live in it now with little opportunity for a way out. In some ways they are still enslaved. Should those folks just get back some raw land to live as they did before enslavement now that we have introduced them to medicine and technology and act like there is no other civilized way to live but this way? That is what I believe apartheid tried to do. No one has even taught them to farm the land. And forbid they were given any where useful minerals and resources were abundant.

Affirmative action is one solution with lots of complications in and of itself. It could be a whole other blog. It’s a conversation we have included alongside this one in the past several days.

These are complicated questions. Questions we don’t consider often in our day to day lives. It’s so much easier to proverbially close our eyes to get on with the day, tending to our own small lives. That is important too. We need to keep our own house in order for any chance of success in happiness and being an asset to our communities.

The scariest thing I believe I heard in the past week was the trust in government that all the free people in South Africa had when apartheid was announced. No one was scared because they didn’t think anything unfair could happen in such an advanced society. I shudder at how the US could easily fall apart if we allowed the differences in skin color, gender, sexual orientation, culture, country of origin, etc to influence any kind of law when any human can lose any human right(s). I know our government deals with absolutely nearly impossible dilemmas with limited resources and has to make decisions for the greater good. I wouldn’t want to be in higher office with the pointed fingers when most people have never considered how incredibly complex and tangled the web we have woven is.

It’s almost too much for anyone to contemplate. But is it too complicated and messed up for an individual to make a difference? I don’t know. What I do know is that we have domain on how we show up in the world. Perhaps we should consider the following recipe for living:

– Be kind to others.

– Don’t take more than you need.

– Treat everyone equally.

– Learn to think critically.

– Become informed about potential laws and take action as a voting citizen.

– Make decisions for the greater good in your own life.

– Take care of yourself and your family (sleep, nutrition and movement) so you can be healthy and gain the respect of your community.

– Make time to relax and play so you are the best version of your creative self.

– Find just one to two things you really believe in and feel passionate would make the world a better place. Direct your working energy toward that. You can make a difference.

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead

If you enjoyed my writing, consider leaving a comment, sharing with others, or following my blog

https://esterinaanderson.com

On a Disjointed Life

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

105928270_4db43f009f_o

 

This blog is mostly in response to one my husband Daren wrote a few weeks back https://darenamd.wordpress.com/2016/07/23/on-the-value-of-rituals/

We did chat that day in the coffee shop, and I’ve been thinking about this for a few weeks now. One of the reasons rituals are so awesome is because it traces something back to it’s roots and honors something in it’s entirety. Well, there is nothing alone in its entirety. Anyone who is Facebook friends with me (IF they paid any attention to my page) would know that for the past 7+ years the main quote sitting on my profile is: When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. – John Muir

I love that quote. I’ve used it in many conversations and presentations in a variety of formats. We can trace everything almost continuously including ourselves back to the stars. We and everything around us is made of star stuff (thank you kindly Carl Sagan for coining that term in my head forever). If we do actually think about this & how we are all nothing but star stuff; it’s easy to see nothing at all or just outright chaos. But if we ignore everything else and only focus on one piece of the universal pie we miss understanding and appreciating the beauty of the tie in. And feel very much alone.

Our human brains need to draw natural lines to understand something so it’s not all chaos or nothing at all. We also need to stop those lines in a place that we as humans can understand something and make sense of it. What I would argue is happening in the world today is that those lines we draw around something to make sense of it are becoming smaller and smaller.

Take for instance a shoemaker 150 years ago. He had a little shop in the heart of a town. People who lived in that town acquired their shoes there. The shoemaker knew his customers well. Everyone had a role in the town’s functioning and everyone supported everyone else to keep that town running through trade, bartering or monetary exchange. They were all they had and likely felt a sense of community and oneness. Mr. Shoemaker made the shoes from start to finish. He knew where the material came from, how they were put together. He literally created every stitch and hammered every sole. When he walked through town and saw others, he saw his creations on their feet. He felt connected to the product he made and the people who benefited from it. He appreciated the art of his work, which helped him to inherently understand and appreciate the products and services of his fellow townsfolk. Making shoes was a ritual and the universal lines were drawn around the whole shoe and the tie into the community and other humans.

At some point in history, machines and the assembly line were developed and broke up shoe making and nearly every other previous manual whole process that we could as humans possibly get our hands on. The universal lines broke down even smaller. Instead of making shoes; one stood on a line and mechanically made just a sole, or hammered in the same piece of stinking shoe over and over. The pride and ritual of the shoe in it’s entirely was lost. It became harder to connect with the final product. Supply chains were built up and one would no longer see the product they created on the feet of habitants of their town. In fact today, no one really knows any longer where things were created or how they were put together. People started working outside of their towns and traveling alone to jobs on long commutes to do things they don’t feel a part of. While our world is becoming more and more connected, humans are becoming more and more disjointed from the origin of their being; and their own worlds are becoming smaller and smaller.

I love Daren’s example of the record player. It was a ritual to play a song or album. The anticipation of hearing a song would build up as you went through the process of getting all set up. Manually making that happen while we wished it were faster felt very satisfying. Now that I have every song I have ever heard or could want to hear in my life at my fingertips, I just don’t enjoy music like I used to. Daren’s example of the coffee making process is simply beautiful. Making a cup of coffee in the morning was a means to true enjoyment. Manual effort was put in. The waiting made it all the more special. Do we really enjoy the k-cup, drive through, or 7/11 versions of coffee in disposable containers as much? As we gulp them down without thought? …several times a day for most.

Our on the go life style has started to suck the pleasure out of life. We aren’t connected to the things we do, the food we put into our body, or the people we run into during the day. We see ourselves as separate, and not part of the whole. Unless you own your own business, most of us who work have little to no connection to the mission of our jobs. We feel like a part in a machine with no connection to the outcome or even our own humanness. I march through the VA facility where I work and see the patients hobbling down the main corridor as road blocks to the next place I’m heading and already late to. Every so often when the bathroom on my floor is being cleaned and I need to walk down to the floor below, I see patients in the waiting room and checking in. It’s only then I remember that I even work in a hospital. That is sad and a symptom of something gone terribly, terribly wrong.

I wasn’t around back in the shoemaker days, but based on my experience with record players (and cassettes and CDs), and when my mom ground the beans at the end of the line at A&P and then percolated the coffee; I much more enjoyed the older, more manual versions of these and many, many other products and services. We don’t have time to do things in a way that are truly enjoyable any longer. How uncool is that? Why are we trying to do more and more faster and faster? It necessitates a quicker, faster, and smaller means to an end. It’s harder to appreciate the whole when you and everything you take part of is such a small cog in a larger wheel. What’s the rush? What are we accomplishing? Are we happier as a human race? I’m not. Am I alone in this feeling? Even if I am, I want to step out & slow down. I want to know the bigger whole. I’m a bit tired of the disjointed feeling of my being. I miss manual processes and rituals. I want off the treadmill. Anyone care to join me?

 

cog

If you enjoyed my writing, consider leaving a comment, sharing with others, or following my blog

https://esterinaanderson.com