When we met, my husband and I were seemingly at the opposite ends of the political spectrum. Still I did not expect him to oppose me, and this pointed out how deeply my own racism and political expectations were truly buried. I can't speak for him, but I'm quite sure he never in a million years guessed that he'd fall in love with a bleeding heart liberal who believed that paying taxes is a blessing and supporting the arts should be a bottom-line issue. Ewe! How do we live with each other's odd world view??
It occurred to me that exploring our differences and how we put up with each other's point of view and manage forward with our values intact, if adjusted, is something the country needs to explore, too. So that's why I'm writing this blog. The title is after one of my husband's favorite things to say to me about policy decisions made far, far away, an apt commentary on the both-side delusions and responsibilities for the fine mess we find ourselves in.
What drew such different people together besides out right physical attraction? We actually spent hours talking to each other on the phone in a long distance relationship for a year and a half before we spent lots of face time together, and so it was indeed an attraction of mind, and yet finding what we agreed upon was not obvious. Our approach to life itself was formed by very different life experiences. Our expectation for immediate confirmation from the other was never going to work for us. In fact, we are each deeply entrenched in our own political ideologies and unswayed on certain issues. So what we did was to accept difference and we circled around the many issues delicately and perhaps out right avoided them at times in favor of finding agreements because we wanted to serve the concept of love over expectations.
What we could agree upon was responsibility to deal with our current load of debt sensibly. Sensibly turned out to be a loaded word, of course, but we have not strayed from the essence that there are unpleasant things from our separate pasts that we have to take care of, and that we are not punishing ourselves by dealing with them step-by-step, even if it looks that way to others. We imagined that we could do this fairly quickly with two incomes. One of us would support the needs of today, while the other one of us would work to pay down the debts. We took the problem as a sum total, not as separate things that came from former decisions made by other people. The debt was neutral from the start - not one person's fault or the other's person's fault. It was a great big piece of baggage on both of our shoulders and that affected both of our present and future tenses. We ARE in this TOGETHER, and we do not blame each other for mistakes made long before we met, even when people around us think that we might be a little too forgiving.
I think this would be a great place for our nation to start dealing with our debt crisis. Let's stop blaming other side for making this problem. It is entirely useless to blame as the debt is now on all of our laps. It is time for Liberals to stop stroking their egos with congratulations for a budget surplus that existed over a decade ago because even with that surplus WE WERE IN DEBT. It is time for Conservatives to stop stroking their egos on how austere we're willing to be to get over that debt because it is not true as we have never witnessed any true, across-the-board austerity. The fact is both sides racked up some heavy mistakes and now the best thing to do is back up and look at it and recognize it for our own because we are in this together. We ARE in this TOGETHER.
The debt of our family weighs in every single decision we make until we are finished with paying it off. We understand that faster growth would require more leverage, and we don't drink that Kool-Aid. And, YES, it does get more complicated than that almost right away...but that will be the next entry. For now, just imagine not blaming the other side for the mess we are all in right now.
