Recently, I read an essay penned by a disappointed and
dumbfounded son, gut punched in learning of his mother’s vote in the past
presidential election. She supported Donald Trump; he didn’t. From his
perspective, this was reason enough to employ the familial nuclear option and
cease contact with her—absolutely, forevermore, and without further ado. Personally,
I thought the article’s point of view beyond absurd and not, in fact, the whole
story. But it didn’t surprise me. All too many people now view politics as their
religion. Choose your team—
shirts or skins—and don’t fraternize with the
other side. Oh—and this important—don’t ever deviate from the dogma.
For those unfamiliar with the
shirts or skins
reference, it was—and, I suppose, still is—a method of establishing and delineating
two teams in informal male sporting competitions. I first encountered the
shirts
versus skins concept in high school gym class. When we played competitive
games amongst ourselves, teams were organized and distinguished between shirt
wearers and non-wearers.
Speaking of high school memories, I recall school TV
sets tuned into the signing of the Camp David Accords, which were presided over
by President Jimmy Carter and signed by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin
and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Considered a big deal in the fall of 1978—peace
between two formerly mortal enemies—it was history in the making. High hopes
were in the autumn air that this was the beginning—hopefully—of a sea change in
the Middle East.
The very same Jimmy Carter passed away this past week—forty-six
years later—and deserves his due for the good he did as president and
ex-president, although it wasn’t all good. Yet another silly article that I chanced
upon—in
USA Today by David Oliver—was headlined: “Jimmy Carter’s Death
Has Devastated the Nation. It’s OK to Grieve.” Get a grip, man: Carter led a
long and productive life, for sure, and made it to one hundred—count ‘em. He was in hospice
care and his death expected. When forty-six-year-old JFK died from an assassin’s
bullet in November of 1963, the nation was indeed “devastated.” Still, I
remember my father—years after the fact—recounting that day and when he got the
somber news. He was on the job at a post office in Midtown Manhattan when word
came down that President Kennedy had died.
While on his way to work, my
father had been informed by a neighbor that Kennedy had been shot. First
and foremost, some of his co-workers wondered if they would get a day off for
the anticipated funeral, which had yet to be planned, let alone announced. So,
I don’t suspect that many of the federal employees—who will get the day off for
Jimmy Carter next week—will spend their holiday
devastated.
How many of them even know who Jimmy Carter was? I just saw an X tweet from an individual
who knows a Harvard graduate unfamiliar with the name Socrates.
Taylor Swift
ought to write a song about him.
Back to high school, I go, once more—to 1978 again.
Pope Paul VI died in August of that year and his successor, Pope John Paul I, survived
only thirty-three days on the job. Reports were that he succumbed to a heart
attack and—as good fortune would have it in attending a Catholic institution of
learning—my classmates and I got an unexpected holiday for his funeral: Thursday,
October 4th. Now, I will admit to being grateful for this
one brief shining
moment away from the grind and any
shirts versus skins skirmishes.
That was primary in my teen psyche at the time. I wasn’t even all that interested
in the rumors that John Paul I was really bumped off.
And you thought
conspiracy theories were something new? Yes, death never takes a holiday,
but sometimes it provides one.
