This story was written for Medium’s Fiction Shorts.
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
I just don’t understand it. The sun refuses to indulge my despair.
*
Since November 6th, he has gotten up at 4 am.
Three hours before the event.
This ritual calms him.
Eight ounces of water, one scoop of coffee, his white coffee mug, and Rebecca’s for later.
Three presses on the thermostat.
He pees and washes his hands and face.
With his right hand’s thumb and forefinger, he grasps and pulls down the nub that opens the east-facing window blind.
He opens his Macbook Pro and looks at the previous day’s Medium notifications.
Enough time to finish one story.
Intermittently, watching to see if it will happen again.
Carole Olsen asks Are you a kind person? On this National Kindness Day.
*
Her prompt reminded me to fill out the Alt Text field for the first photo. Isn’t that interesting? Carole nudged me toward a small act of kindness for those who could not see the picture. Occasionally, an editor will do the same, as if to say, “Come on, Paul, it’ll only take a minute of your precious time.”
Kindness is more than a feeling. At its core is action. Unsurprisingly, the late Mr. Rogers captures it’s essence:
I hope you’re proud of yourself for the times you’ve said ‘yes,’ when all it meant was extra work for you and was seemingly helpful only to somebody else.
Kindness requires that I extend myself to you.
Photo by the author
Most of the time, I don’t want to. Instead, I act in my self-interest. It seems that is how most humans are.
Unless you’re a member of my family when the arrows naturally point outward.
I’ll bet you’re the same. Imagine your worst fear. Mine is this.
I’ve been claustrophobic since I was a kid. When my friends and I snuck into a drive-in theater, I refused to take my turn hiding in the trunk.
Yet, if I needed to crawl into this tunnel to rescue my son, I would, unhesitatingly. The same would be true for my partner, Rebecca. So, it isn’t just about a blood tie. I’m unsure I could do it if my first cousin Jim, who I like, needed help: “Jim, hold on, the rescue team is on the way.”
My good friend Ed and my favorite Medium writer would also have to wait.
And you, even if you give me 50 claps and an “I love this story.”
*
Acting kindly toward others often depends upon who the other is and how difficult the action is.
My tunnel example is an outlier. Usually, an act of kindness does not require facing our scariest fear.
For example, a friend, Maggie, was a student in a Lifelong Learning course on the 2024 American Presidential election I taught in September. Our class decided to meet again on November 6, the day after Donald Trump beat Kamala Harris. I wrote a little story about this session here.
Most of the twenty-two who showed up last Wednesday were deeply disappointed. Several emailed me saying they couldn’t face talking about what they considered a tragedy for America. Honestly, I probably would have stayed home.
When the mike was passed to Maggie, she said, “I came today because Paul is a friend.”
That was an act of kindness because it required Fred Rogers’ “extra work.” Maggie sacrificed her desire to stay home for me.
*
It’s difficult for humans to extend themselves to others, especially those outside their immediate family.
I’ve noticed something inside me since Mr. Trump won re-election. I first felt it last Wednesday morning as I settled into the shock of the Trump win. Anger, sadness, fear, anxiety, frustration, hopelessness, embarrassment (for my country), and guilt, every negative feeling is banging around inside me.
But the primal scream is not all there is.
Photo by the author
There’s something else I can only describe as kindness — a need to look out for others.
Trump’s America is an unkind place, particularly to those who don’t look like me and Donald, white males.
It’s almost as if my 75-year-old body grabbed and directed those red arrows outward.
I find myself, more than ever before, scanning my little world to see what I can DO to make life easier for others.
Trump has taken so much from me, from us.
I won’t allow him to take this.
To save myself, I’ve got to do what I can to help others.
Photo of a man resting at Castle Beach Park, Tuen Mun, Hong Kong, from Wikimedia Commons
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
This story will end with “Stop.”
*
My mother taught me always to do the right thing.
And to never bask in someone else’s glory.
Today, I’m 82.
Mom is long gone.
Whenever I feel guilty, I sit by the sea.
The never-ending blue calms and clarifies my thinking.
After thirty minutes, my tightened muscles begin to relax.
I can use his title for my story about an old man sitting by the sea without breaking copyright laws.
But should I?
Maybe I can change a couple of words.
What do you think, Mom?
Also, Grammarly said I shouldn’t use old man; older is better.
Note: Yes, we can use book titles without breaking copyright rules. (source). Ernest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea is fair game. So I can, but should I?
Carole Olsen asks Are you a kind person? On this National Kindness Day.
*
Her prompt reminded me to fill out the Alt Text field for the first photo. Isn’t that interesting? Carole nudged me toward a small act of kindness for those who could not see the picture. Occasionally, an editor will do the same, as if to say, “Come on, Paul, it’ll only take a minute of your precious time.”
Kindness is more than a feeling. At its core is action. Unsurprisingly, the late Mr. Rogers captures it’s essence:
I hope you’re proud of yourself for the times you’ve said ‘yes,’ when all it meant was extra work for you and was seemingly helpful only to somebody else.
Kindness requires that I extend myself to you.
Photo by the author
Most of the time, I don’t want to. Instead, I act in my self-interest. It seems that is how most humans are.
Unless you’re a member of my family when the arrows naturally point outward.
I’ll bet you’re the same. Imagine your worst fear. Mine is this.
I’ve been claustrophobic since I was a kid. When my friends and I snuck into a drive-in theater, I refused to take my turn hiding in the trunk.
Yet, if I needed to crawl into this tunnel to rescue my son, I would, unhesitatingly. The same would be true for my partner, Rebecca. So, it isn’t just about a blood tie. I’m unsure I could do it if my first cousin Jim, who I like, needed help: “Jim, hold on, the rescue team is on the way.”
My good friend Ed and my favorite Medium writer would also have to wait.
And you, even if you give me 50 claps and an “I love this story.”
*
Acting kindly toward others often depends upon who the other is and how difficult the action is.
My tunnel example is an outlier. Usually, an act of kindness does not require facing our scariest fear.
For example, a friend, Maggie, was a student in a Lifelong Learning course on the 2024 American Presidential election I taught in September. Our class decided to meet again on November 6, the day after Donald Trump beat Kamala Harris. I wrote a little story about this session here.
Most of the twenty-two who showed up last Wednesday were deeply disappointed. Several emailed me saying they couldn’t face talking about what they considered a tragedy for America. Honestly, I probably would have stayed home.
When the mike was passed to Maggie, she said, “I came today because Paul is a friend.”
That was an act of kindness because it required Fred Rogers’ “extra work.” Maggie sacrificed her desire to stay home for me.
*
It’s difficult for humans to extend themselves to others, especially those outside their immediate family.
I’ve noticed something inside me since Mr. Trump won re-election. I first felt it last Wednesday morning as I settled into the shock of the Trump win. Anger, sadness, fear, anxiety, frustration, hopelessness, embarrassment (for my country), and guilt, every negative feeling is banging around inside me.
But the primal scream is not all there is.
Photo by the author
There’s something else I can only describe as kindness — a need to look out for others.
Trump’s America is an unkind place, particularly to those who don’t look like me and Donald, white males.
It’s almost as if my 75-year-old body grabbed and directed those red arrows outward.
I find myself, more than ever before, scanning my little world to see what I can DO to make life easier for others.
Trump has taken so much from me, from us.
I won’t allow him to take this.
To save myself, I’ve got to do what I can to help others.
This Drabble was written for Medium’s Fiction Shorts.
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
*
4 AM
Dear God:
The Psalm says seventy years; eighty with strength.
I’m at 75. Does this durability come from You or my mother?
She believed; my father didn’t.
Like him, I think we are alone.
But I’m on my knees because I don’t know what else to do.
Drabble Challenge #312: The random word is marshal.
A photo by the author of Hammock (A Woman Suffering) from The Courtauld Gallery, London
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
The last sentence will be, “It wasn’t perfect, but it was enough.”
*
He wasn’t sure they would come.
But it was up to him to marshal the group.
So he bought 12 donuts. Sharon brought coffee, tea, and lemonade.
And cut the donuts in two.
Don said it was a loaves and fishes sort of day.
He passed the microphone.
I don’t know what to do with my anger.
What has happened to my country?
America turned its back on its women.
It’s all connected to Covid and inflation.
I will face my depression until it departs.
Some cried and hugged; the wound had opened.
It wasn’t perfect, but it was enough.
Note: In September, I taught a Lifelong Learning class on the American 2024 Presidential Election. The students’ ages ranged from 50 to 91. Several asked if we could meet the day after the election. Twenty-two showed up ready to talk. The healing has begun.
With a stunning lack of foresight, I suggested this prompt to the Medium publication The Challenged.
*
I ought to own my November 6 prompt: how do you feel the day after America’s National Elections?
Besides, it will give me a chance to start mourning.
Later today, I’m meeting with a group of Lifelong Learners who took my seminar on the 2024 American election in September. Several asked if we could meet the day after the election.
I’m 75, and the 35 students’ ages ranged from 50 to 91.
I think there were a few Republicans in the class, but most were, like me, liberal Democrats. I don’t think anyone supported Donald Trump.
In our first session in September, I asked the class whether they thought this Presidential election was the most important of their lifetimes. Ninety-one-year-old Will, a retired Religion and Classics Professor, raised his hand and said, “I was born in 1931. I think Roosevelt vs. Hoover in 1932 was the most important. This one is second.”
I taught American politics to college students for forty years, retiring in 2018. My courses included a quadrennial course on the American Presidential election. Since retirement, I’ve continued that penance in my former college’s Lifelong program. I always tried to keep my politics out of my classrooms, and that’s how I taught the September class.
Last week, I took my act on the road and gave a few talks on the American election at the University of West in Timișoara, Romania. This January, I plan to do a post-election session in another Lifelong Learning program at The Art Institute in San Miguel, Mexico.
This is my third morning after a referendum on Donald Trump. And the second mourning. As I write this story, it appears he will again capture the American presidency. In 2016, like many others, I was not mentally or psychologically prepared for a Trump victory.
Yesterday, I was confident of a Kamala Harris victory. After receiving President Biden’s baton, she ran a flawless campaign. Her campaign had money, a solid ground game in the swing states, and, most importantly, the moment’s zeitgeist.
I thought her twin arguments about freedom and abortion and Trump’s unfitness for office would carry the day. They didn’t.
It’s too early for prognostication, and at this moment, I don’t have the heart for it.
*
The title of my talk on the American election in Romania was “American Democracy in Crisis.” During one session, the Dean of West University — a Shakespearean scholar someone told me later — said something I now think more about. She said a crisis can offer opportunity. It can force us to look at what we don’t want to look at.
I’m asking myself now, in the privacy of my office, what has led America once again to choose this damaged man? Donald Trump ran the darkest presidential campaign in American history.
What should we look at about America that can begin to explain this?
As I expressed in a story I link below, in 2016, I was shocked by the Trump victory because I assumed two Barack Obama victories proved America had loosened itself forever from its history of bigotry, misogyny, and intolerance that the forces of backlash were less powerful than the forces of progress.
In 2020, just before the January 6 riot that attempted to overturn Joe Biden’s victory, former President Obama said
AMERICA IS THE FIRST REAL EXPERIMENT IN BUILDING A LARGE, MULTIETHNIC, MULTICULTURAL DEMOCRACY, AND WE DON’T KNOW IF IT CAN HOLD.
I’m not sure it can — not as sure as I would have been with a Harris victory.
For now, I’ve got to think about what I will say to my Lifelong Learners later today if anyone shows up.
Misery loves company. It may need company.
Sometimes, depression is precisely the right feeling.
This story was written for Medioum’s Fiction Shorts.
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
The first sentence will be: You probably won’t believe me.
*
“You probably won’t believe me. But we like the tinted windshield, officer.”
“Please step down and away from the car. Is the driver inside the service station?”
“I’m the driver. You probably won’t believe that either.”
“Can I see your license?”
“Dog, rabies, or driver’s?”
“Oh, a wise guy, huh?”
“Officer, Who are you talking to?”
“Sir, Are you the owner of this car?”
“And Fido. Is there a problem?”
“Does your dog drive the car?”
“Is that what he said? Well, that would be against the law, wouldn’t it, officer? Fido, apologize to the nice policeman.”
This story was written for Medium’s Fiction Shorts.
A Drabble is a concise 100-word story that respects your busy schedule. Your presence here matters. Please stay on the page for thirty seconds so you will count as a reader. Thank you.
Of course, this story will be a double Drabble.
*
God: Kris, welcome.
Kris: Why me, Lord?
You were a good man. Anyone who could write Sunday Morning Coming Down could be saved.
What did I ever do?
You didn’t have to do anything. I loved you as I love all. As each is.
Years ago, I admitted needing you. You mean you loved me before that?
My love was never transactional; sadly, many people get that wrong. I gave you the breath of life; my love followed.
What did I do to deserve the pleasures of my life?
Let me ask you something, Kris. Are you surprised to be talking to me?
I wasn’t sure what I’d find on this side. And I don’t see you. I sense your presence. Are you real? Is this heaven?
Heaven is not a place. Do you feel at peace?
I do, Lord.
You asked before what you did to deserve the pleasures of life. Some never ask that question. They feel entitled. I loved your songs because they came from a humble heart.
Was my soul in your hand?
Each soul is precious to me.
Is that where peace comes from?
It was always there, Kris. That’s where Sunday Morning came from.
Kris Kristofferson died on September 28, 2024. Below, he tells the story of where the song Why Me, Lord came from. You can find the lyrics that I use in this story here. Sunday Morning is here.
Photo by the author of Victory Square in Timișoara, Romania
Anxiety
I took this photo a few days ago as we were wrapping up two weeks in Timișoara, Romania. ‘They’re on a precipice,’ I thought, just as we Americans are as we approach our national quadrennial ritual.
I was born in 1949. This election feels like the most critical of my lifetime.We could go one way, toward the Declaration of Independence’s aspiration of equality, or turn back toward the ugliness of exclusion. Both options are ‘as American as apple pie.’
The Romanian and American Fulbright Commission sponsored my visit to talk with audiences about The Crisis of American Democracy*. West University hosted Rebecca and me in this beautiful western Romanian city.
Romanians are also anxious about the election. They fear what a Trump victory might mean for the NATO alliance of which Romania is a member and Russian aggression at Romania’s borders. Historically, Romania’s geography has put it at risk from invading armies. Imagine living in a country that sits between Germany and Russia.
Here are two photos from one of my talks.
Photo by University of West publicistPhoto by West University Publicist
A loss of innocence
I taught politics to college students for forty years, retiring in 2018. One of my regular courses was a seminar on the American presidential election in the fall of an election year.
The first sentence on each syllabus was always, “This is the most important election of your lifetime.” History has finally caught up with my hyperbole.
In 2016, I remember telling my students that Donald Trump had a 30% chance of winning. That was pollster Nate Silver’s estimate a week before the election. We live in a probabilistic world, and sometimes, improbable things happen.
I even joked the week before the election and after the Chicago Cubs had won the World Series, coming back from a 3–1 deficit, that odds makers had given the Cubs only a 15% chance of victory. If the Cubs could do it, then so could Trump.
But when Trump won, most of my students and I were unprepared. We had yet to internalize the possibility. Now, I know that roughly half of America was jubilant. I have a friend who sat up on election night with his 95-year-old mother, and both cheered when Trump’s victory was announced.
I was devastated. I recall thinking I didn’t know anything about my country. How could America go from Barack Obama to Donald Trump? What crashed and burned that night was my innocence.
What do I mean by innocence? I thought the election of the first Black president proved Martin Luther King, Jr’s dictate:
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. (source)
America had made progress toward the Declaration of Independence’s equality aspiration. Obama the person proved that.
But I had forgotten that the struggle for inclusion is never over in America. There is always a backlash.
Former slave Frederick Douglass put it this way.
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” (source)
Write a letter to yourself
For eight years, I’ve focused on understanding these two parts of America: progress and regress. Barack Obama’s election made Donald Trump inevitable. If not in 2016, someone else like him and MAGA would appear at some other time.
A fierce backlash was inevitable. When Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden on the ticket, we were given a contrasting image of two visions of America competing.
One vision is a multiethnic democracy.
The other is an America of the past.
I don’t know which vision will win next week.
Even if our side wins, the struggle for equality and inclusion will not be over.
Some forces in America always want to take us back. This phenomenon explains the extremism of Donald Trump’s language of division and hate in the last few weeks of the campaign. He and many of his supporters know exactly what’s at stake.
Robert Hubbell, one of my favorite political analysts, suggests writing a letter to yourself you will read when you know the winner. He says to thank yourself for the efforts you have made to make America a better place for your grandchildren.
And to remind yourself that you are standing on the shoulders of other Americans who fought the good fight.
My camera’s magnifying lens shows the Romanian workers working around the edge. They understand the danger; perhaps that is the secret.
Photo by the author
Building an American house big enough, welcoming enough, and generous enough to include everyone requires constant vigilance.
That labor won’t end even if Harris wins.
If she loses, we’ll return to that roof the next day.
