Seriously. I know that we all care so much about the national election (Well, except for those of us who have thrown up our hands and started glutting ourselves on strudel because we can’t take it any more.) but local races? They matter.
Why?
1. It’s the local races that often start the candidate pool that leads up to the big races. Not always obviously. Our current president didn’t do this, but most politicians do.
Sheep: Dude? Why do we all look the same?We are not all the same!
2. Local issues matter. No. Really. They do.
Gabby the Dog says:The only issue I care about is tongue length and cookies for all canines? Will you vote with me?
No matter what your political leanings are, it’s easy to get all huffy and upset over what presidents do, but local issues matter too.
It’s stuff like school funding, energy programs, how high your property taxes are, what kind of development goes into your town, whether you have a playground or not, whether or not you can put a sign on your business that doesn’t have to be pre-approved, fire and police budgets, if you can put a fence in your backyard.
It sounds silly, but the consequences of local decisions (for example sprawl due to lack of regional planning leading to higher childhood obesity rates leading to higher costs of health care) are really far reaching.
Sparty the Dog:The only issue I care about is One Dog = Eighteen Daily Walks. Is that local enough?
I’ve met a couple people when I’ve knocked on doors who have told me that they probably aren’t going to vote because they don’t like either of the main parties’ presidential candidates.
That kills me. Seriously. I can understand not liking any presidential candidates. It has happened to me almost every four years, but there are other races. There are U.S. senators and city councils and people going onto library boards who might want to ban books. Honestly… a woman in Texas once got to be constable because she was the only one who showed up?!? That kills me, too.
3. You Have A Responsibility
People fought and protested to get the right to vote in this country. We didn’t all just magically have it the moment the country started. People risked their health, their lives to be able to participate in the decisions that impact them and their lives. People still do.
Imagine if someone told you that you couldn’t vote because of your gender, your race, your economic status, your sexuality, your level of physical ability, because you were too poor? That’s what used to happen. Do you know how you keep that from happening again? You vote.
Here’s a handy site that tells you where to do that in your state or district.
And sometimes people still don’t get to vote. If you can do it, please do.
Insert Begging Here.
VOTE!!! Vote for all parts of the ticket not just president. It’s so much cooler than not voting at all.
PREORDER MY NEW NOVEL!
It’s a little book baby and it’s out October 1. It’s sparse and stark and makes me cry. I hope you’ll preorder it for .99. So cheap! So cheap for tears. After Oct.1, the cost goes up to $2.99.
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This weekend one of my tweets was put in a Twitter Moment, which are ‘curated stories’ that someone puts together almost like a slideshow. And it was a little strange because while there were suddenly thousands of likes, there were also some random people saying that I made the tweet/interaction up.
And part of me was like, “Wow. They think I’m that clever! That’s so nice.”
And another part of me was like, “Wow. Humanity is pretty sad if people are grumpy about my tweet.”
And then there was a whole other aspect when a couple of people used my tweet to expose their hate about lesbians.
“Don’t look,” my friends told me. “Just don’t even read the comments. There’s nothing you can do.”
Hope and despair and anger.
In politics they can be collective movements, ways to band together. And right now many of my friends are full of despair and longing for hope. And a couple of my friends are full of hope. And some are full of anger. And I am full of all of those emotions and more.
And I worry for all of us.
“All we need is… all we need is hope and for that we have each other,” Andra Day sings in her song ‘Rise Up,’ which you should absolutely go listen to whenever possible because it’s a brilliant song by a talented woman.
Pluralism
Back in 1993, John Rawls talked about how in a pluralistic society with multiple points of views and desired outcomes, there can be no final consensus amongst us, its citizens.
My tweet was a little bit of evidence about that, but Rawls is talking more about government and political outcomes.
He argued that governments can’t make all citizens happy, so all we can expect is for the government to go after those main causes that almost everyone agrees on – human rights, to not discriminate, to make decisions in a democratic and rational way. Anything bigger than that? It’s impossible to achieve.
And this is sort of amusing now (in a bad way) because it seems that even those main causes are no longer agreed upon. I mean, I’ve been trolled for writing about sexual trafficking and human trafficking. It seems like ending human slavery would be one of those main causes that everyone agrees on. And yet…?
Self Respect
Decades before this, back in the 1970s, Rawls noted that the self respect is integral. A citizen of a society can only have self respect when she/he/they know that their country is committed to justice and fair treatment for them.
And that expectation – that they matter, that they won’t be discriminated against, that the laws are fair – is currently being dismantled for a lot of Americans and for many Americans, that expectation has been pretty fragile for awhile now because of race and ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion, physical ability, and class. For some of the disenfranchised that expectation has barely existed ever. Yet, there needs to be hope that that expectation will exist and will be met, that we will all be heard, treated with dignity, be free and safe to worship, marry, vote, learn, and live without threat of bodily harm.
So how do you find hope?
Remember these things:
Younger generations are smart and charged up.
More diverse people are running for office
The more extreme people get, the more there becomes a call for the middle – and leaders for that middle. Consensus builders. We need consensus builders in a world of polarities.
The stripping away of belief in institutions and in our selves actually leads us towards a collective orientation towards hope again, towards something we can (or most of us can) work towards. Because all the good guys want rights, want respect, want others to be respected, too.
As Sam Dresser writes, “When political movements seek to rekindle hope, they are not acting on the assumption that individual people no longer hope for things – they are building on the idea that hope does not currently shape our collective orientation toward the future. The promise of a ‘politics of hope’ is thus the promise that hope for social justice will become part of the sphere of collective action, of politics itself.”
Hope and despair and anger? They can co-exist. They can lead to action. They aren’t definitive states. I despair that some people are evil and I’m angry at injustices, but I hope that I can take action and change things and that we can collectively rise about those things, and that I personally can become a better human. I hope you’ll do that, too.
My despair and anger can lead to hope and action and change. The emotions can overlap and coexist just like people do. But to do that, we have to ‘have each other,’ as Andra Day sings.
So, let’s do that. Let’s have each other instead of having at each other.
WRITING NEWS
NEED is on sale for Kindle sales on Amazon for a mere $1,99 this month. Snatch it up!
ENHANCED, the follow-up to FLYING is here! And the books are out of this world. Please buy them and support a writer.
The last TIME STOPPERS BOOK is out and I love it. You should buy it because it’s empowering and about friendship and bias and magic. Plus, dragons and elves.
How to Get Signed Copies:
If you would like to purchase signed copies of my books, you can do so through the awesome Sherman’s Book Store in Bar Harbor, Maine or the amazing Briar Patch. The books are also available online at places like Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
For signed copies – email barharbor@shermans.com for Sherman’s or email info@briarpatchbooks.comand let them know the titles in which you are interested. There’s sometimes a waiting list, but they are the best option. Plus, you’re supporting an adorable local bookstore run by some really wonderful humans. But here’s the Amazon link, too!
Art Stuff
You can buy prints of my art here. Thank you so much for supporting my books and me and each other. I hope you have an amazing day.
A new episode of Dogs are Smarter Than People, the quirky podcast with writing tips, life tips and a random thought comes out tomorrow! Check it out, like and subscribe!
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
People are always asking me if I’ll run for political office again and I’m always like, “Um. Hell-a no.”
The last time I ran for office, the honchos at the political party I was involved with told me to shut down my blog because it was sort of um… childish? Too candid? Too self deprecating? Too goofy? All those things.
It wasn’t really mature, basically. I totally get that.
But the thing is? I can’t be fake. I can’t be boastful and super confident. I am quirky and have a muppet voice. People don’t vote for that. People hug that.
And one of those stories that I shared on my blog, which made me pretty unelectable was this one about seeing angels. Here you go. Read it and know that you, too, would never vote for me.
The post
I am sick. I am really REALLY feverish sick. So sick that I spent last night shivering and having hallucinations. I saw angels in the door to my bedroom.
Seriously.
So what did I do?
I shivered under the covers and said, “Please do not let the Emster get sick because she has show choir auditions on Thursday.”
Angels said, “You are a blessed child of God.”
I said, “Uh-huh. But about Em… Could you please not let her get sick?”
Angels said, “You are a child of God and you are blessed.
I said, “Thanks. That’s so super nice, angels, and I really really appreciate you all being here, but… um… since you are here… could you um…? But, um, about Em…and show choir…”
Angels said, “You are blessed.”
I said, “What does that mean exactly?”
Angels sang. The doors glowed. I was left shivering and wondering if I’d be locked up soon and if Em would indeed not get sick.
The next day, I was getting interviewed for the newspaper THE BANGOR DAILY NEWS. I foolishly told the reporter guy I was sick and hallucinated about angels.
And that is why I an unelectable.
Random Marketing and Book Things Since I am an Author and Not a Politician
My nonfiction picture book about Moe Berg, the pro ball player who became a spy was all official on March 1 and I’m super psyched about it. You can order it!
Kirkus Review says:A captivating true story of a spy, secret hero, and baseball player too.
The podcast, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE, has a new podcast that came out Tuesday. Shaun swears the mother of all swears in it. Sorry.
And finally, I made a little video for my TIME STOPPERS books.
Time Stoppers’s third book comes out this summer. It’s been called a cross between Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, but with heart. It takes place in Acadia National Park in Bar Harbor, Maine. I need to think of awesome ways to promote it because this little book series is the book series of my own middle grade heart. Plus, I wrote it for the Emster. Plus, it is fun.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
