Guess who’s not coming to dinner
The sound of the clambering, crashing iron gates is deafening. Stay focused- do not let fatigue, hunger, or thirst interfere with the power of prayer, hopes, and dreams for the coming year. Our hearts and minds must remain open until the last moment when our chits are called in by a higher authority. The sacred N’ilah service and the shrill sound of the final blast of the shofar signify the last moments of Yom Kippur. Hurry, the gates are closing!
The High Holidays are complicated- a formula of prayer, joy, reflection, repentance, and hope surround the opening and closing of G-d’s Book of Life. Jews pray for a year filled with peace, and the health, safety, and prosperity of friends and relatives, and our country. Once the gates of heaven close our fates are sealed for another year. But doing and accruing good deeds is a life-long job; we fear being locked out.
For the past four years, we have been torn between two realities- the one we have known most of our lives, and the other we are unwilling to accept. We ask ourselves how these two worlds can be so disparate.
The first universe is familiar. It is a land where cooler heads prevail. Science, medicine, rationality, and the press are valued, embraced, and respected. It is a world where people share their own opinions, not their own facts. And we value decency, honesty, integrity, and justice.
The second is a combination of parallel and alternative universes in which our beliefs and values have been highjacked. We are forced to stave off a fantasy world of altered facts, lies, dystopian fiction, dissonant sounds, and single-minded people. Our country is a long way from home.
Rallies with speakers spewing lies, fear, division, insults, and hoaxes are welcomed by maskless, tightly packed crowds. Raging riffs of doublespeak, word salad from someone who believes he alone can fix it transcend this universe. Some of us believe that ultimately facts and reality will trump lies!
Living in this parallel or alternative universe may feel like a throwback to weekly episodes of the television series, The Twilight Zone. Each episode began: the dimension of imagination, is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition. In the safety of our living rooms we were transported to worlds in which ordinary people found themselves in extraordinary circumstances. Today, we are those people.
To escape our chaotic world and survive the pandemic, we live vicariously through TV series about the lives of other families. The number of seasons or episodes do not scare us; we have plenty of time. As the advertisement suggested, “Calgon, take me away.” If it were only as easy as a warm bubble bath.
So, we binge watch powerful stories of fictional families around the world: the Blighs in Australia, The Crawleys in the UK, the Lowanders in Sweden, the Bosches in LA, the Larchers in Occupied France, and the Levys in Schitts Creek- where we appear to be right now. It is easier to deal with their disappointments, crises, and losses than our own. Our lives and their narratives have become synergistic, so even long after a series ends we continue to think and talk about them. Eventually we let them go and we move on to share the travails of another family.
The first pandemic Thanksgiving may be a new version of a Norman Rockwell painting. Since our relatives and closest friends will not be at the table, it might be fun to imagine inviting our new screen families and friends to fill the void. Just envision the intense and lively conversations we could have with our fictional families and friends: doctors, lawyers, nurses, mayors, detectives, Earls, Ladies, restauranteurs, or just plain folks. We can invent a new parlor game: Who Would You Invite to a Pandemic Thanksgiving?
Many of us have a lot for which we are thankful. But record-breaking numbers of COVID illnesses and death, lost jobs and homes, remote or hybrid education, food insecurity, systemic racism, increased mental health issues, addiction, a very divided nation, and hundreds of children who will never be united with their parents are our reality.
The election gates are closing. Our pockets and pens are empty from money we have donated and postcards we have written. Millions of people have already voted by mail, hand-carried ballots to the polls, or checked online to be sure their votes count. Some stand in long lines in the dark or in pouring rain risking intimidation, voter suppression, and existential poll taxes.
But we must be vigilant until the final doors at the polls are closed and locked and the last mail-in vote has been counted. November 3rd cannot get here soon enough. The soul of democracy is on the line!
We long for the day when we can clear our heads of Russian operatives, insults, conspiracy theories, and tweets. If we listen carefully, we can almost hear the beeping of septic pumper trucks removing the waste from the Washington DC cesspool. And somewhere, someone is warming up to sing the final note that will signal the end of this chaos. The clock is ticking.
As we hunker down for a long winter, we live in hope that scientists, not politicians, will save us, journalists will return to reporting the news, and fact checkers will be obsolete. Together we can concentrate on restoring our broken world. There is so much good to be done!
And I can look forward to those long-awaited words, Mom, I’m home!
