Electionblues

By the
time you read this, the election will be over and hopefully
the winner will have been declared.



Or at least this is the way it should be.



However in today’s media driven world, who can predict what
is going to happen or might happen in the next few weeks?
All of us are suffering from election fatigue as a result of
the past year of campaigning by both parties. I can’t think
of any other country in the world that has such a long
period of time allocated to the determination of who will
lead us over the next four years. I suspect that if you are
at all like me, you are numbed and partially brain dead from
all of the statistics, poll numbers and blah, blah, blah we
have been subjected to for the past several months.
Everywhere you look, you see signs of election
zombies…citizens walking around aimlessly with dark circles
under their eyes from too few hours of sleep. Neighbors have
turned against one another as we headed into the home
stretch. We are reduced to discussing topics as bizarre as
“are there really UFO’s” and “who really discovered America”
to avoid political arguments with our friends, family and
spouses.



Last week, we went to dinner with our next-door neighbors.
We are on different sides of this political war. We set the
ground rules prior to leaving the house. No politics. As I
stated before this leaves you with very little to talk about
over the course of a long meal. Not that we were desperate,
but about half way through the dinner, somehow we got off on
trying to remember the words to “The Twelve Days of
Christmas.” We got stuck on the fourth day…what was it? No
one could remember this one…”On the fourth day of
Christmas…. my true love gave to me” ….What? . We all had
items one, two and three and some of the others, but for the
life of us couldn’t get item number four.



We did maids milking, swans swimming, lords leaping,
drummers drumming and five gold rings, but no item number
four for the life of us. The wait staff became curious and
asked us to explain. We did and soon all the waiters and
waitresses along with the cooks were either signing or
humming the same tune trying to figure out what happened on
day four. Our meal was being constantly interrupted with
suggestions, all to no avail.



Finally I called a friend of mine who is a trivia buff and
he quickly questioned how could we have forgotten that there
were…”four calling birds”? End of the mystery. Then he asked
if we could remember the names of the seven dwarfs. This was
enough to get us through the rest of the meal. I think we
got most of them correct, but am still uncertain that Sleazy
and Sneaky were part of the original group.



This is America at it’s best. We should all get down on our
knees and thank God we live in a country that allows us to
have the freedom to vote, the freedom to speak our own minds
and the freedom to state our opinions. The current elections
show we are almost equally divided in our thinking. This
isn’t a bad thing in my mind. It is a mechanism that should
help to keep us honest and to know that someone out there is
always watching what those in power are doing on a daily
basis. Or those who want to be in power.



We as a nation are relatively young by history standards,
but we have shown the world that we can agree to disagree
and still be one nation after all is said and done. This has
not always been the case in other countries of the world. In
fact in the early days of our nation it was widely suspected
that the incoming party would assassinate the members of the
outgoing party. As we know this has rarely happened. Perhaps
never.



Well, now we can get back to the business at hand and look
forward to four more years of listening to the pundits share
their views with us on how smart they were or how misled
they were. Thank God for Sponge Bob…he has yet to make any
political comments.



I wonder if my neighbors even know who Sponge Bob is?