It’s usually in the simmer of my sleep where an opening line or topic will come to me for this bloggy thing.

I had two different first lines, or topics if you will, come to me in the last eight hours.

The first one: I really need to take an English class and learn about punctuation.

I have no clue when to use a comma or one of these — or a : or anything really. What I do is read my post out loud, and if I stumble, I throw a comma or a — in. Then if I go back and read the post another day I cringe, and think, I really should go take a fucking grade 9 English class.

The second topic is more interesting to me.

There is a saying in recovery.
Go where you are celebrated — not tolerated.

I used to get so mad at my father for only listening to FOX news or talk radio. I would tell him he is living in a fish bowl, that there are a zillion other voices and truths in the world. That he was only hearing one horrid side to anything. Still, he would not tolerate any doubt that FOX news was the news. I thought him so small minded.

Then, this election. And the shock, surprise and horror of it all struck me in the face.

Who the hell voted for him? Worse – who didn’t bother to vote at all?

Then, it became quite clear that like my father, I also live in a fish bowl. Granted, it is a different one than his, but a bowl just the same.

I think I know only one or two people that might have voted for Trump. Like her or not, I was sure EVERYBODY would be voting for Hillary, except the few other asshats that voted for Gary Johnson or hung hard to Bernie. More so, I can’t possibly know anyone who wouldn’t vote!

Wow, my world must be super small because, 50% of the voters who turned out — voted for him and 48% of eligible voters didn’t even bother to vote. And, I don’t think I know any of these folks!

I do know the one of three women who have been assaulted. I also can count the one in seven women in my life who got breast cancer. The one in 10 who are addicts or alcoholics — yup – I know them too.

But, one out of two people voted for Trump. WTF? I do not know these people.

That tells me, I’m in the same boat as my father was. I listen to what I want to listen to, and apparently, I’m not as big on diversity as I like to think I am. It is very apparent that I am not tolerant of hateful, cruel and bigoted people.

Case in point. When Trump was declared the winner — a person I knew from the past posted a meme of the Simpson character Nelson Munch, pointing at me saying, “Ha-Ha!”

Without hesitation – I “unfriended” him.

There is a story in the big book of AA, that tells of a man who survived a tornado in a root cellar. When it was all over — he poked his head out, and even though his entire house and town had been destroyed, said, something like, “Nothing to see here — looks good to me.”

For me, there is such a fine line between being comfortable, and being uninformed.

I see now, the reason I was shocked at the results of this election — is like my father before me, I get my news from the fish bowl of knowledge that are the people I love and celebrate and not from those I say I tolerate — but really don’t.

_________

So – then I saw this video and at first it really pissed me off, because I have high regard for Hillary. I always have and I still do. Then… I thought about all he was saying. Maybe this is true for me, and why I’m not as diverse in my thinking as I am in my friends.

It’s food for thought anyway – and I’m chewing.