Dear Connor,

Almost two decades ago, sitting on the balcony overlooking the rough Atlantic Ocean off the Outer Banks in North Carolina, your Uncle Robert and I shared a moment of agreement: The United States was swiftly headed toward a second Civil War.

The conversation that got us there wasn’t a particularly pleasant one, because we were coming from two different directions. He was sure the political dissonance of those times could be squarely loaded on liberal shoulders. I blamed the Christian Nationalist right and a litany of my-way-or-the-highway conservative hardliners. I may have used words like “racist,” “bigot,” “misogynist.” Probably not “deplorables,” because that was before Hillary Clinton.

But we finally realized we were coming to the same conclusion.

No matter WHY it was happening, the country was on a irrevocable path to a cataclysmic constitutional shift, the likes of which we hadn’t seen since the Civil War, which in 1860 pitted the Union against the Confederacy.

How, we asked, would America fight a second Civil War? Wars are pretty much fought in a place. We “go to war,” which implies we pack up the ol’ kit bag, a gun and some ammo, kiss the babies farewell and we march off to some place. The Union had a fixed destination in mind, the slave states below the Mason-Dixon Line. Today that kind of geographic delineation is not so clear.

There are strong “Union” cities smack in the middle of equally determined “Confederate” states. Given the sheer geographic diaspora of Americans these days, there’s simply no clear fault line. So we looked farther back in history and agreed this one would be more like the Revolutionary War, fighting among neighbors and between towns, perhaps among a handful of neighboring states. However it transpired, the second Civil War would leave no region unscathed. War would be up close and very, very personal.

And because we had all afternoon to do so, we capped off our apocalyptic nightmare with a riff on “Oh and don’t forget, the entire digital world will collapse, leaving us isolated and virtually (no pun intended) unable to maintain a shred of our per-collapse lives.” No water. No electricity. No FAA and civilian airports. No access to money, whether it be the monthly Social Security check, a stock portfolio or an ATM. Whatever digital privacy we thought we had (and it never was much) would be in the hands of a few powerful geeks who had no interest in whether we survived. They’d get theirs; the rest of us would be collateral damage.

Scary? Sure. I get nauseated thinking about that conversation. But it was a beautiful, sunny day. We were enjoying the annual family reunion, with good food, lots of hugs, plenty of catching up and the Wi-Fi worked. I think we had spaghetti with red sauce that night. All was right with the world.

We knew it really wasn’t, of course. The realization of those predictions was a long way off. No need to get too exercised. Heck, maybe, there on that balcony, we were simply indulging our overactive imaginations. Lands, I wish we’d been wrong.

Living the crisis ain’t as much fun as predicting it.

Talking it sure isn’t living it

Here I sit today on my Key West porch a half mile from the Gulf of Mexico (I’m not changing; it’s a little piece of resistance). It’s a lovely mid-February day, kinda like that September day on the Outer Banks. I helped some friends this morning, did my strength training with your Ghee, added a half hour of yoga, then went to Publix for the weekly groceries. Chatted up the checkout girl and the nice folks behind me in line. Cleaned the bathroom and fed Molly the Cat, who at 18 is still my kitten. Telephoned the new pastor about software for the church office. Planned leftovers for supper.

And I did my midday digital scroll through the unraveling of America’s constitutional democracy. Lands, we are in a world of hurt. That train’s done left the tracks and is hurtling, unstoppable, over the cliff. Even if some super-heroine reached down and grabbed the engine mid-free-fall, the wreckage behind it will take at least a decade to clear.

Should we be running around like Henny Penny screaming “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!”? Gotta admit, there’s a chunk of my brain that says, “Scream away, my friends. We’re doomed.” But that’s neither helpful nor productive. Instead, here’s how I am coping — and resisting.

First, acceptance. I will accept that I will have to walk this unholy, frightening, nightmarish path. Don’t want to, of course, but we’re not going back to the ways it used to be. We are in the proverbial uncharted waters and we’re going to have to get through this. No super-heroine is coming to save us.

Second, faith in the future and the basic goodness of people. I absolutely know we will find our ways through and that we will be OK when the crises are resolved — and they will be. Though it may not be rainbows and unicorns again in my lifetime, the arching toward justice will happen in yours, Connor. How long will we be in this horror show before we see a rebirth of our country? I’m predicting 8 to 10 years. Tops. (Assuming, of course, humanity doesn’t actually blow up Earth.)

Third, commit to the “little things”: I can do something every day to make someone else’s life better. I can be gracious, compassionate and caring. I can do for a neighbor or stranger what they can’t do for themselves. President George Bush the Elder took a lot of dismissive chortling for his “Thousand Points of Light” speech in 1988, but he was right. It’s up to each of us, individually and together, to make our country a place of justice. We do not need laws and regulations to do the right things. We can simply do good. Never, ever forget that.

Show up. Speak out. Hold a hand. Sit and listen. Join a protest. Bake a cake. Sweep the sidewalk. Pick up the litter. Send a check to those helping others; heaven knows they need it. Make a donation to those fighting in the courts to help them minimize the damage. What I do — what you do — every day matters.

I will not sacrifice my humanity, my compassion, on the altar of despair, outrage and futility.

And fourth, I will give voice to the voiceless for as long as I am able to think and write. I have the skills and the experience to say aloud and write the words that others may be fearful of sharing. Won’t make me popular with the trolls and it’s likely to put me in the crosshairs of those who dream of a country run by and for powerful white, straight men. I don’t care. I’ve lived a long, fulfilling life, rarely failing to speak out at injustice. It’s not an easy place to be. But I will do it because I can. Silence is not an option.

I am speaking, as George the Elder said in 1988, “of a new engagement in the lives of others, a new activism, hands-on and involved, that gets the job done.”

Author’s note: I began writing these in 2016 as my construct for making sense of the unraveling American community. Connor may never read them, nor might others; but they’ll help me distill solutions from the cacophony that passes for discourse in the final crisis of generational turning of America. Read all the essays.

I am speaking of a new engagement in the lives of others, a new activism, hands-on and involved, that gets the job done. We must bring in the generations, harnessing the unused talent of the elderly and the unfocused energy of the young. For not only leadership is passed from generation to generation, but so is stewardship. And the generation born after the Second World War has come of age.
I have spoken of a thousand points of light, of all the community organizations that are spread like stars throughout the Nation, doing good. We will work hand in hand, encouraging, sometimes leading, sometimes being led, rewarding. We will work on this in the White House, in the Cabinet agencies. I will go to the people and the programs that are the brighter points of light, and I will ask every member of my government to become involved. The old ideas are new again because they are not old, they are timeless: duty, sacrifice, commitment, and a patriotism that finds its expression in taking part and pitching in. — President George Bush the Elder