The Littlest Strawberry

Yesterday was Halloween as most of us know. It was a time when, as a child, I viewed it as great fun anticipating all the "loot" I would collect when calories did not matter. It gave me the opportunity to dress up as the favorite characters of my childhood from Superman to my cowboy hero The Lone Ranger. I could go to familiar homes and greet neighbors I knew so well with whom I ate lunches and dinners sometimes more than I had in my own only-child home. It was a different time.

We, most of us, knew each other from those in the homes at the top of the street to those in the homes at the bottom. I played with and knew everyone and everyone knew everyone else too. No one feared going out even at night alone. It was a different time.

In our time it has become apparent, at least to me, that few of us know each other who live sometimes across the street. In fact, most on my street I do not know at all. Homes have been constructed at the very top of the street but those homes may as well have been constructed in the next town where I would not know anyone at all. It is a different time.

I am sad that this is so as this nation seems to have contracted into respective tribal camps. There used to be a sense of us instead of a sense of them. It is, indeed, sadly, a different time.

And this brings me to my final thought. The doorbell rang yet again on Halloween and this time I was visited by the most adorable two year old little girl with big dark soulful eyes. When I asked what she was dressed as she said in a tiny voice "A strawberry." A strawberry? I asked surprised and examined her costume. Yes, indeed, she was the cutest little strawberry I have ever seen. I asked her mother where she lives and she said she lived close to my house across the street. I lamented that fact of how sad it was that on the same street where I used to know everyone I know so few today. Her lovely mother, who was just as nice as the littlest strawberry she had in tow, agreed. 

Yes, it is a different time and lamentably so. Maybe we all must work a little harder to get to know one another even if our tribal allegiances are different. When we know one another the impetus to see each other as different transcends a bridge to our common humanity. We are after all simply human and, yes, we are all in this together. The utterly adorable littlest strawberry brought these very big thoughts to my mind.

I hope when she grows up our worlds will not be so different from one another’s. I hope she will be able to see the common humanity that will keep us together to tolerate and transcend the smaller differences that keep us a world apart!


Why we must elect Democrats and even reach out to Republicans who are reachable to join our side to prevent those who would keep us separate, divided and apart!

The Ugly "American" -- A Letter to Extremist Ted Cruz

Ted Cruz, you immoral, narcissistic, demagogic charlatan, tell the people the WHOLE truth of what you attempted to do to our country and failed. You attempted to treasonously bring down the government and world economies with it. You, an American Senator who is Canadian born, tried to reach into our homeland, get elected to our Senate from Texas by those who know no better, to subvert the nation. God only hopes when the time comes that you suffer the loss of your Senate seat and God hopes that you never do damage like that to our nation, attempting to wound it beyond repair to hurt the people and their president, again.

Tell the American people who and what you really are about – YOU – and no one else. You are mean, you are cruel and you were truly NOT even born here UNlike our president who was! You will, of course, NEVER be president and would not be president even if you were native born.

The Republican majority in the House and in the state houses everywhere is GOING DOWN and we the true patriots, for love of country, WILL see to it that they do. Shame on you, Mr. Cruz. You are truly a mendacious, depraved and ugly man inside and out!

TED CRUZ AND THOSE LIKE HIM ARE PROOF POSITIVE, AS IF WE NEEDED ANY MORE, WHY REPUBLICANS MUST BE ELECTORALLY CRUSHED IN 2014 IN THE CONGRESSIONAL HOUSE AND IN STATE HOUSES ALL OVER THE NATION. REPUBLICANS HAVE BANKRUPTED THEIR STATES, ENACTED LAWS AGAINST WOMEN, AND MOST REPULSIVELY SUPPRESSED THE VOTE OF THOSE WHO WOULD VOTE AGAINST THEM. THEY WILL LIE, STEAL AND CHEAT THE SYSTEM DEPRIVING AMERICANS OF THE DEMOCRACY WE RIGHTFULLY SHOULD HAVE. WORK TO OVERTHROW REPUBLICAN POWER -- LEGALLY -- BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY!