Finish Lines

Today’s blog is about rites of passage and finish lines. When you’re younger, you begin to experience a series of rites of passage. Your first kiss, your driver’s license, the prom in high school graduation, maybe college graduation, marriage, first kid, and career milestones are all markers that your life is progressing as it should. But I’m past all that. I’ve begun breaking the tape on a series of finish lines. I first thought about this when I turned 60. That’s when I realized and admitted to myself that I was old. I’d already gone through the phases of saying 40 is the new 30, 50 is the new 40, but 60 is just 60. You can no longer dodge it or pretend. After that finish line, I turned 65. That’s when I was required to sign up for Medicare and TRICARE for life. For life.

I think my next finish line will be retirement. The plan now is for that to happen in September 2018. There is a tradition where I work to present retirees with a sad Indian on a horse. It’s like a graphic symbol that it’s time for you to die. I don’t see my retirement that way. My body still works. My mind still works. There are things I have planned and want to do. As long as I can drive safely, road trips will be a big part of my future. Vera and I have discussed opening our own art gallery. She has connections with several very good artists. I think it would be fun and useful to manage and work in the gallery. She already has a very good business advisor and we will meet with him in a few weeks. Since I’m a natural born planner, it seems smart to start this planning three years out.

There is another aspect of rites of passage. I also measure my life by when my sons experience their own rites of passage. I’ve never liked the concept of pride, but I permit myself to feel a certain amount of pride when my boys graduate from high school or college, begin careers, establish stable relationships (today’s substitute for marriage), or just begin to figure out and find their way in the world.

The significance of finish lines is not lost. I realize and I’m perfectly comfortable with the knowledge that each finish line I cross brings me closer to the final finish line. I’m good with that. Every human starts the same race. Every human will finish it. I figured out a couple of years ago that the start and finish are not as important as the race itself. I have been luckier than most with the experiences I’ve crammed between those two markers. I’ve gotten a great education, found a great life partner, had three great sons, and I’ve seen the world. I’ve managed to have two great careers, one as a Russian linguist in the Army, and one as an English teacher. I’m still fairly healthy and expect to live quite a bit longer. However, I know full well that I may not. And all I can say about that is, it’s okay. Life is good.

Not satire this time

What's the point? We are completely, absolutely a divided nation. It's time for us to consider peaceful, reasonable options for splitting up. Here's my proposal:
First, a 5-year latent period. We will be one nation until we sort out who goes where, how we split up the military, Social Security, taxes, etc. It will take at least that long.
Second, who goes where. I like the idea of at least three new countries. There are some states with a persistent liberal point of view - California, New York, Oregon, Washington, Connecticut, New Jersey, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Maryland. That looks like a pretty nice country to me. There could be a better name, but for convenience, let's call them the Liberal States of America. Conservative States of America could be Texas, Arizona, Mississippi, Kansas, Arkansas, Georgia, Alabama. Independent States of America might be outliers like Alaska, Idaho, the Dakotas, Montana. Remaining states could have an election to decide which new country they wanted to align themselves with.
This makes sense primarily because we've become such a sick, mean-spirited country. The second Republican debate made me realize that there are people in this country who truly believe that any of those people would be a better president than any Democrat. On all the major issues, these people stood exactly opposite me - I love Planned Parenthood and it's a matter of conscience that it be funded. To them, it's a matter of conscience to defund Planned Parenthood. To them, it's a matter of conscience to go after illegal aliens. To me, it's a matter of conscience to give long-term resident undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship. To them, taxes must be cut, government must be cut, the military must expand. I am against all of those. I use "I," but I do mean "we." Most liberals agree with me on these points. I say let the people who believe this have their way, but without imposing their national view on the rest of us. And this way, we won't be trying to impose our national view on them. They can have the homophobic, small-government, "I before we" religious republic they want, and we liberals get the European-style version of socialism lite that we want.
The only thing stopping us is this emotional attachment to the concept of the United States as a single entity. Well, you know what? That's been dead since Reagan was president.
There would be another benefit. The rest of the world wouldn't have to suffer the consequences of the US using its military to manage the rest of the world. Yes, there would be some violent repercussions while that vacuum was filled. Countries and regions would have to solve their own problems. That won't be peaceful, but it's not exactly peaceful now, is it?
That 5-year latent period would also give a lot of us time to move to our country of choice. I would not be able to stay in Texas, but there are people who would not want to stay in Liberal States of America, so maybe a property swap could be arranged.
Finally, this could be set up as 5-year latency, then 10-year trial period. At the end of ten years, we could have a national referendum to see if we wanted to become the United States of America again. I suspect we wouldn't want to.