"Il cibo è il linguaggio dell'amore."
Food is the language of love.
(An Italian Proverb)
No Matter What
I’ve had a long standing habit of wishing people a good day “no matter what.” I didn’t realize when I started doing it that I was unconsciously promoting internal locus of control. Words really are spells. Casting that spell has worked really well for me over the years. I can’t control all of the things that come at me, but I can control how I manage myself in the midst of them. So can you!
Election Eve
I’m writing this blog on Election Day Eve, 2024. It’s pretty clear that there won’t be a definitive Presidential winner by Wednesday, and possibly not for some time, so it felt important to offer some healing perspective in the midst of so much swirling uncertainty.
I think it’s low key hilarious that I went to find some of my older blogs to link here and stumbled into the blog I wrote on Election Eve in 2020. I had totally forgotten about it. Guess what the title is? Yup, “No Matter What.” I even started it roughly the same way and with the same quote. I’m annoyed with my lack of creativity and memory, but the message itself stands the test of time.
Here We Are Again
Unfortunately I was right that the 2020 election would spur violence. I would have preferred to be wrong. And yet, here we are. Also as predicted, we managed it.
Many of us are exhausted from the past 10 years. I will admit that I did start looking up “Best Places to be an American Expat” a few months ago, just in case. (Costa Rica seems viable.) Since then, however, I’ve come to a different sense of balance over it all.
Tree Lessons
My dog Zen and I regularly walk a trail that goes through Lake Roland Park in the mornings. The path is cut part way down a very steep incline. As such, there are trees that have found ways to grow on some truly improbable terrain. (You can see some of them in this YouTube short.) Their roots have found any little crevice of dirt in the rock face and taken fierce hold! Some grow at a nearly 90-degree angle from their root ball.
Regardless of conditions , they find the soil and they find the water. Their tenacity inspires me.
Italian Lessons
I have a friend who shared with me that her friends in Italy recently offered some sage perspective with her, concerning election anxiety. The Italian friend explained that politics in Italy have been a complete mess for as long as anyone can remember. In response, many Italian people shift their focus to something much more immediately important: They make good food, they love one another, they build families and communities, they dream dreams and enjoy whatever they have.
Few things have put my deeply embedded American Exceptionalism in my face like the politics of the last three election cycles. Mind you, I’ve had a conscious problem with American Exceptionalism ever since I started became intrigued by politics in high school, (a million years ago, during the Cold War and the Reagan Administration.) 40+ years later I am still pulling these miscreant threads out of my thinking!
Why do I assume that we have some magical blessing that will always deliver us free and fair elections and a peaceful transfer of power? People all over the world survive without either one. I still prefer that kind of democracy and I will continue to fight and vote for it, but I’m not entitled to it, nor is it the only way I can see managing life.
What Matters
Italian culture is interwoven with some spectacular hospitality. I’ve heard it described as “Love served on a plate.” It’s so much more than just food: It’s connection, it’s joy, it's staying mindful and celebrating what’s good. That does not require any particular national politics.
Regardless of who wins the elections at the federal, state and local levels, I am well-prepared to double down on what’s good. I’m still going to do what I am here to do. I hope you will too.
A Way Through
Regardless of who ends up in the White House, the Congress and the Senate, it will remain true that there are at least two dramatically different visions for our future as a country. Regardless of who wins these elections, we will be pulled in two opposing directions. Regardless of who wins these elections, many of us will:
Stand up for the needs of all of the humans no matter what.
Stand up for the needs of the earth and everything in and on it, no matter what.
Stand up for a system that works for everyone, no matter what.
No Matter What
How the power positions shake out may shape how we do these things, but it will not stop us from doing them. I will be doing what I do, helping to empower others to heal and take their unique place in the world. (Even if I’m doing it from Costa Rica!)