My mood is down. Many things are occupying my mental capacity and they include this “search for fulfillment” that I am on, my mother’s alcoholism and our attempts to help her and my own recovery process. There is also the unbelievable results of this election; I am really beside myself wondering how so many people think Donald-fucking-Trump is the best person to lead the most powerful country in the world.

I had a meeting with E on Monday. I had been working it up in my mind as the career breakthrough that I’d been waiting and longing for. I started the meeting with a synopsis (that I had practiced delivering beforehand) of what I was doing and why I was there. After my 5 minute introduction he started by saying he didn’t think I needed to do that and that Christ led him and the answer was inside me. I felt invalidated and marginalized. He had no interest in me as a person; rather, he was interested in what I could do for him and how I could help the company. Even though I clearly communicated that I was not there to solicit a job, it is important to know that secretly I coveted the opportunity to be associated with that company again.

After taking the wind out of my sails, E tried to get me to come back as a PT so that I could manage my own department and eventually, my own club. 1. I’m not interested in going back to the same job I held 20 years ago. I was successful at it then and for three years. If that isn’t evidence enough of my ability and personality, then fuck it. 2. The company hasn’t really changed. The same machismo meatheads are in charge and the great success they’ve had has only fueled the narcissism. I wouldn’t fit in there. I’m too introspective and identify more with intellectuals than athletes. My interaction with E confirms that he is looking for the latter, just as he was 20 years ago. 3. Why do we need to bring Christ into it? Listen, if that’s what someone believes and it helps them live a better life, so be it. But don’t try to influence me with that crap. I don’t believe in any organized religion that deems itself to be the one true discipline and that other practices are wrong or worse, blasphemous. Keep it to yourself E. I hope you and JC can go skipping through the flowers together.

Dealing with my mother’s alcoholism directly ties in to my own recovery. My mom took no interest in me as a child or an adult. She also has no relationship with my daughter, her only grandchild. There are many deep-seated hurts that I try to bring to the surface for expression so they do not continue to have a subconscious but powerful and detrimental affect on every single other important relationship and interaction in my life. An example is the meeting with E. Some of what he said was taken very personally, too personally. In the grand scheme of things, who gives a fuck what he thinks or says? He does not know me. But… for 36 hours after the meeting my mood was near the lowest point it gets from time to time. It still is having some sort of affect on me now, more than 48 hours later.

The direction we are going in is to do an intervention on mom. Before that would have any chance of success, my youngest sister and stepfather need to be on board. M is my stepdad, B’s, daughter. They both have alcoholic tendencies and may or may not be classified as such according to the DSM-V manual. M was at the meeting last night with the interventionist and I’m not entirely sure she is buying into the idea. In order to get B involved, M needs to be in 100%. So all of this secrecy and maneuvering to get the opportunity to sit down with B to convince him to meet with the interventionist and then, hopefully, accept that treatment is the only option for mom is taking a toll on me and I suppose, bringing up some very old feelings. I’m working on identifying what those are and trying to express them with my therapist but as I write this, I don’t know quite how to explain them.

Trump… What the hell is going on? Speaking of religion, I’ve wondered if he is the Antichrist. But then he says something so incredibly stupid that I realize he isn’t charming enough. But still, how do so many people fall under his spell? The only mandate anyone seems to coalesce around is the vague notion of change. Change something, change anything, change everything. It does not seem to matter that he is a misogynist bordering on sexual predator, a selfish tax manipulator, has defaulted numerous times on the debt he agrees to borrow, seems to be cronies with the leader of a country that America has long distrusted and viewed as our greatest rival, openly makes incredibly inflammatory remarks regarding foreign and domestic people and entities that challenge him, and has shown himself to be an absolute demagogue with virtually no political experience or political stance beyond the rhetoric of “change” and “make America great again”.

Who are these people that buy into this bullshit? The anger regarding the current political system is palpable and I share in feeling it. But that doesn’t mean we turn over the keys to someone who we know simply as the tough boss from reality TV that espouses the themes we want to hear without the details to support and explain it. Somewhere in the back of my mind I’m thinking there is a chance, just a chance, that Trump could prove all us disbelievers wrong. However it still doesn’t excuse the behavior of the stupid, yes I said stupid and I stand by it, American voters that pay attention to sound bites and emotion, and respond to populist crowdsourcing that alleviates the candidate from having to define their platform. Its almost like a work of art; the piece will mean different things to the different people that view it. If the artist never explains what it means to them, then the work might reach a wider audience and have a greater emotional affect as viewers adopt the meaning that fits best for them.

Feels good to write but the knot in the pit of my stomach is still there. It’s almost always there but sometimes it radiates less. In those moments I can be still and let the gratitude wash over me, wiping away the sadness.