Am I the fierce eagle on a t-shirt I saw in a catalogue I get or the tiny kitten on another t-shirt in the catalogue trying to hold on to a branch?
I‘m both – the outraged eagle at Trump’s threat to democracy and the kitten struggling to understand his voters.
I was born in Houston, reared a Catholic and have lived in Texas for most of my life. I was always so proud of Texas. Now I am deeply ashamed of it. My Texas is gone.
When I was 18, I was on a train in Italy during the 1950s on a visit there, in a compartment with some Italians. I didn’t speak Italian. They didn’t speak English. One looked at me and asked “Born,?” one of the few English words he knew. I smiled and said “Texas!” The Italians broke into huge grins, lifting their arms as though they were holding reins, bouncing up and down.
I was taught never to lie, cheat or steal, never to use profane language, curse at another person, defame them or threaten them and never to abandon those in need. It’s what I taught my children. It’s a way of life we love and will work hard to defend.
Our suffering under Trump has begun. This is what Trump’s rule is already doing to Texas and America. I got this email about that from my son in Houston a week ago: “My Ukrainian American co-worker, Andrew, and I have been greeting each other every day with “Heroyam Slava,” meaning “Glory to Ukraine!” after Putin invaded Ukraine, and members of his family were killed. Since the election, his eyes have been welling up, and he’s been choking back tears as he talks about his fears for the rest of his family.
“Anna, my Russian immigrant co-worker, now a naturalized citizen, embarrassed to be Russian, expresses her anxiety that Putin will start to invade other countries, triggering a wider war in Europe. Alysa, a young, pretty co-worker wept as she recalled a group of young men chanting “Your body, my choice!” on the campus of her school yesterday.
“My Latino co-workers from mixed status families are worried about their families being torn apart. African American co-workers are having racist slurs aimed their way. On and on. The Democratic customers in our store have been quite somber. The gleeful gloating from Republican customers, and a few co-workers, has been turning my stomach. I was so ready to celebrate, now I would like nothing more than to checkout. But I know that I won’t.”
My other son and daughter won’t “check-out” either. The eagle and kitten live side by side in our hearts and souls. We will never give up fighting against the greatest threat to our democracy since our country’s founding.
Remember this: Trump did not win by a landslide. He won by 237,000 votes in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania – swing states that assured his win in the electoral college.
Keep fighting friends. We can hope after all.
Jodie Sinclair is an award-winning writer who holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University and resides in Bandera.
