Certainly, his speech was laden with a sense of stake and dread. Unusually, a former president openly criticized and dismissed the current office-holder but that wasn’t the religion he espoused. He asked for, he demanded, fealty to the concept of Democracy.

I believe… that cisgender is not a synonym for normal but a synonym for ordinary. Thus, those outside of the ordinary are naturally extraordinary rather than abnormal. Reframe things and we all win.

I finally met my mildly reviled neighbor . . .

…that insurance is no more than the membership fee for entering a doctor’s office. It is not actually insurance against catastrophe but a payment to be allowed in the room.

…that the sudden shock and surprise that several of our worst states in terms of rights for anyone but the wealthy decided to put laws into place to challenge Roe v. Wade in the Supreme Court indicates either a blissful ignorance or a sad complacency. It’s like we saw the big dog eating bowls of slightly rotten meat and its own feces and, days later, were awestruck when it shit all over the living room.

…that the hysteria surrounding Y2K was worldwide, caused a low-grade mass anxiety, and ultimately makes us all (those around for it) look a bit silly in hindsight. When confronting all of the hysteria, low-grade anxiety of today, I'd suggest we remember Y2K.