I haven’t posted since August. I’m sorry. There’s been a lot going on. My brother’s near death following his stroke, the calamity of the election, my daughter’s graduation from Michigan, and my continual crumbling into a bony pile thanks to my back condition.
It’s also true that I quit having ideas. As with many people, Trump was, as the current saying goes, living rent-free in my head. The mood of the blog imploded; the darkness that is Trump bent my tone to bitter despair. That will end, as I’ll explain.
I’ve begun to celebrate the things I can control, like this blog. A friend said not too long ago that the better blogs were those that were about me and my life. I have trouble crediting that but OK. I have a lot to say about my life, my brother’s illness, and this debilitating disease, my lack of loneliness, and a lot other beside.
Trump is going away; first, the next post will be the last about Trump in 2025 unless he dies, then I’ll try to find a lot of happy emojis. But I need to say what I think his election says about Americans. Second, that he is going away means that I am consciously going to blast the dark cloud off of the blog and try harder to let the humor that Michael Barnes cited as encouragement for this blog to rule the year.
In encouragement of the blog tone adjustment, Lord Santorini, Duke of York, portrayed below considers a nap, in terrier-adjacent excited delight.
My title here refers to the long break I’ve taken. I don’t know if it’s earned or not, but I posted more or less constantly for five years. When the unspeakable happened last November, I thought, I just can’t.
But I’m back, as Hunter S. Thompson said, for good or ill. Let’s make America fun again!
