I’m still feeling absolutely wiped, despite spending the weekend in a sort of convalescence. I’ve only begun to believe that I am on the mend as my usual level of pain has started to return. That was the wonderful part of the weekend (if one can count feeling horrible and coughing up a lung or two as wonderful): my legs and back were pain-free, and I only had to worry about fever and mucous production. Now I just have a lingering headache, a cough that won’t go quietly into the night, and that familiar stabbing pain that punctuates my every step. Aside from all of that, though, I’m feeling pretty good. Well, good enough to try and put in a day at the Home Office. I’ve told myself that I won’t turn off the cable news until I’ve written my blog entry for the day, and all the nonsense on my television is only making this headache worse, so I had better get to it.

It makes me want to rule the world with an iron fist. I’m tired of seeing all the slick, pretested messages and the conscious tomfoolery of those in power who seek out prosperity for themselves and their own, while hanging the rest of us out to dry. I’m tired of watching the parade of the worst of humanity, and listening to the inane judgments of anchors trying to fill a slow news day. I mean, I laid out my plan for the betterment of all mankind several times on this very blog, yet apparently no one has been reading it. Either that, or they simply aren’t paying that much attention. If we could all just sit down with one another and talk, we might discover that we have more in common with our polar opposites than we might have imagined. I know this to be true because I am a bleeding-heart liberal, and my family is made up of war hawks and 1% apologists. And yet, when you put to rest the tired rhetoric and talking points, it turns out that we actually feel quite similarly about several key issues. It’s when each side gets lost in their own political code words that the walls are raised and communication fails.

Current events are bleeding into my brain, and the headache has just put in a Jacuzzi. I said it in 2008, and now that the 2016 Presidential Campaign is apparently underway, I’ll say it again: I do not want a Clinton/Bush rematch. I will not vote for Hillary Clinton. I will not vote for Jeb Bush. It’s bad enough that we’re stuck with a two-party system, I cannot even tolerate the notion that we could be stuck in a two-family system. And given enough time, it’s easy enough for two families to become one, and therein lies the road to empire. Worst case scenario? Sure. I mean, it’s not like there are any other parallels in this country to the Roman Empire. I read an opinion piece while I was still on The Island, blaming the fall of the American Empire on our fading values, as in, the secularization of the country. That seems to be the go-to answer these days: everything would be all right if it weren’t for those godless heathens. Maybe I’m just being over-sensitive, as I am not actually in possession of a hearth.

But I’m not going down that rabbit-hole today. It’s easy to fall back into dystopian fantasies when surround by hopelessness of today. But things are bad enough without inventing things to fear. At least, that’s what I scream at Fox News every time it happens to be on my television. But that idea of a Bush/Clinton dynasty keeps percolating in the deepest reaches of my brain, and it makes me worried by its utter plausibility. And that’s just the sideshow meant to distract me: that line of reasoning is turning sharply away from where from where my attention should be, which is the rising oligarchy which seems no longer content to remain hidden in the shadows. When money can buy power, and power controls the frame of the debate, it sometimes seems hopeless to the single voices of the common men and women. Hold on, let me get my tinfoil. Sorry, I had to pop a baked potato in the oven.

I apologize if I seem a little all over the place today. I’m still feeling pretty blah, and I just can’t seem to find a rhythm to sink myself into. My wife just informed me that Spring Cleaning is coming early this year, as we’re going to excavate our bedroom, just to see if there is still, in fact, a floor. The downside to moderate prosperity has been the accumulation of things, and with my wife and I sharing a room with the Minkey, it’s not that surprising that we’ve begun running out of space. Well, actually, we’ve been out of space for quite awhile, but as my wife and I were working opposite shifts, it wasn’t necessarily as apparent. I guess that means the clock is ticking for me to find a source of steady income. When the adult kids and our grandson move out, we’ll have all the space of which we have been dreaming these past few years living as a giant family. I look forward to just how empty this nest of ours will appear, though missing out on my grandson will take some getting used to.

But with a daughter on the way, our grown-up kids are aware that we simply cannot fit the lot of us in the same two-bedroom apartment that can’t even fit those of us who are crammed in here at the moment. I wonder if my grandson will realize just how lucky he has been to see his grandparents every day, to spend time with them and enjoy the benefits of a multi-generational familial experience. I hope that we will be lucky enough to spoil our coming princess, and that she will choose to seek us out, just as her brother has done. Okay, maybe leg room isn’t everything. I know we can’t keep living like we have been, but when I get down to the things which I will miss, I find the face of my precious little toddler in a gigantic grin as he plays and runs around the living room chasing after (and being chased by) his uncle David. I wish I had a few million dollars, so that I could set us up in a nice couple of houses next to one another, where we could live nearby, but no longer beneath the same roof.

-Tex