Well Newsom will be our Governor for the rest of his term. The efforts to roust him from office failed. Regardless of how I might feel about this, I am thinking more about what this whole process signifies in our country right now. To me it signifies a failure to recall the past...
The state voted Newsom into office for a term of four years. What just happened was what I see happening everywhere right now...people not wanting to play by the rules that have governed us for a long time. Now, it appears we live in a world where what was voted on, can now be re-voted on and changed despite what was voted on before. That causes me to feel really unstable.
I was very unhappy when GW Bush Jr. got elected. Like I didn’t get out of bed for a day. I was horribly depressed and upset. However, I did not band together with all of my like minded friends and cry that the election was rigged, that it wasn’t fair, that he shouldn’t have won. He did. Despite my very contrary desires and vote, he won and I accepted it and moved on with my life.
What I see happening is a complete erosion of our society being able to accept this long standing tradition called Democracy. Now we have some new form of government which is really a kind of not so passive anarchy where some of the people can disrupt the flow of prior votes because they are unhappy with the way the person who won the office is managing that same office. I am not sure if people remember this so I will repeat it here - THIS IS WHY WE HAVE ELECTIONS EVERY FOUR YEARS! If you do not like the job the elected official is doing, then vote. Vote your conscience, vote your belief, fucking vote.
At the risk of sounding old, I do not like this new world we are moving into. I do not agree with this coddling of feeling that then allows for drastic change in governmental structures based on feeling not fact. It makes me feel unsafe. It makes me fear for the future. I think we are headed for a dark time. A very, very dark time. I can feel it coming. Two sides being forced to battle each other for life perspective and access to resources. Sounds very Mad Max like but I am not sure we aren’t already pretty far along on this trajectory.
The world is a very unsettled place right now. Lots of fear abounds. People are scared and worried and in my experience scared people do not make good decisions. Scared people do crazy things that only cause there to be more fear, angst and worry.
So on the defeat of the recall, I ask you to recall the antidote for fear...love. For me, I am going to spend today radiating love out to everyone, even those people I do not agree with, who spent a fuck ton of money to try to get Gavin removed. I am going to send a lot of light their way and try to hear why they are so unhappy. I am going to listen so that perhaps in the hearing I can participate in healing for all of us.
COVID, political and racial unrest, financial troubles and worry, familial uncertainty, worldwide pandemics these things are happening to all of us. EVERYONE ON THE PLANET! None of us is immune. Let’s recall that when someone gets sick in Wuhan China, the whole world is affected. We are all connected. We are all wanting the same things in this life: love, security, safety, health, resources. And for me so long as there is one person being denied, all of us are denied. Perhaps maybe we can all recall that we are all sentient beings just fucking it up on the daily. And we could all use a little grace, even Governor Newsom. Let's recall that.
