by Loren Adams – January 28, 2009
The night of January 9 I had another dream most vivid. It
was of America's future.
My wife, younger son (b1976) and I are on a roadtrip across
the USA.
Highways are now like obstacle courses with many detours,
pot holes and gravely surfaces. No construction, just disrepair. And then at
one detour we happened upon a patrolman of Southern flair, who turns on his
lights and pulls us over. He immediately recognizes my government credentials
-- probably from my new Bush-mandated national ID handed him.
After examining my docs, he asks, "Mr. Adams, do you
have any idea why I pulled you over? (Long pause as if not expecting an answer
as he inspects my documents further.) I see you're one of those highfalutin
government guys. Well, everybody else ain't doin' so well these days, are we?
And yet you and your misses drive around in this goddam fancy car of yours as
if nobody else deserves better. So, I'm goin' to fine you real big and maybe
out of the goodness of my heart let you go."
I reply as respectfully as I can, "Why, officer, we
weren't doing anything wrong, just driving down the road at speed limit."
Patrolman: "That ain't the point, Mr. Adams. I'm finin'
you to be finin' you. Don't need a excuse anymore anyhow; remember Bush? You
were drivin' this 'spensive car, that's all."
It's our 2008 Nissan Altima; haven't bought new since 2008
and it's now 2015, or so my dream tells me. I look around at other vehicles and
it looks like Cuba vintage 1965. Dilapidated, rusty old models approaching
antique rattling down the road, though few in number, held together by duct
tape and bailing wire. It looks Third Worldly, but America's version. They
speak English but look Banana Republic. Scene reminds me too of Mel Gibson's
"Road Warriors," except the foliage is green.
Finally the officer let's us go, $1,000 later.
We proceed to Virginia, Joyce's home.
But we don't recognize it. Used to in the old days
Virginians prided themselves as not being like their cousins, the West
Virginians. But now Virginia more resembles West Virginia. But worse.
Appalachian squalor is spread.
All along the highway (what used to be Interstate 81) I
notice little fires out front houses. Then I observe women cooking, outside not
in, much like Native Americans pre-European invasion. Next I view what's being
eaten. Dogs and cats are on the table. I deduct beef is luxury. I'm sickened.
I drive a little closer and notice people in filthy rags,
unlike Virginia's old days when folk wore their best and kept lawns
well-manicured, even among the poorest of the poor. Yards are grossly
overgrown, trees and bushes untrimmed. Their pride is gone; never thought it
would happen, least not in Virginia.
Then it startles me more to look on their faces. Sullen,
slumped posture, weary and with blackened teeth (what's left of them), they
seem ravished by depression and more -- perhaps a world conflict which cuts off
energy before America has time to retool, perhaps fuel made unaffordable by
another Great Depression; I can only guess. I see a population in decay and
despair. Little plumes of smoke rise from each yard as if tribal dwellings. I
ask why. "No electric," they reply. "No gas, no oil, only
wood." Where's coal? No new autos either; auto manufacturing died years
before. Even the Japanese didn't recover. So, folk must make-do, repair what
they can, and salvage the rest.
My dream has us traveling up Big Walker, such a pristine
drive in the old days, heart of the Appalachians, could see five states from
the top. Suddenly I slam on the brakes, because up ahead I notice the highway
drops off unexpectedly into a deep ravine. No warning signs, no dead-end
indicator. I get out of the Altima to examine. The asphalt is cut as if by a
quake and fallen into the canyon below with no state highway department to
rebuild or even erect warning signs.
It's truly an every-man-for-himself Republican world. No one
is responsible except to himself/herself. And now we wait for the "pulling
up by the bootstraps" part. It never comes, only to the lawless and
dishonest.
I cry. Then wake to transcribe before dream evaporates.
This is Bush's America we didn't deserve, only the stubborn
loyal base which applauded despite fraudulent election returns and manifest
outcome from the poor policy of greed and oligarchy. Surreal? Yes. Yet real.
After waking I think, "Obama can't repair, only rally;
can't cure, only console." We can't expect miracles after years of
neglect, especially with voices on the right still at full volume pumping out
nonsense and religious heretic rhetoric making Jesus squirm.
The impediment to recovery is an obstinate right-wing
determined to destroy for the personal. And destroy they will.
Will Obama's "Yes We Can" upgrade to "We
Shall Overcome" at America's crossroads? Will the dream of Martin Luther
King, Jr., prevail against nightmare's fulfillment? Is Renaissance remotely
possible?
Or will America again fall back to assassins' bullets and
secret oligarchic plots spawning needless wars and economic meltdown?
Surely there's good news at the door to Inaugural, a door
either opened or blocked forever. We shall have either mourning or morning in
America. Very soon. 