A Conservative In Indian Country - Running The Gantlet In La-La Land

John Hancock - no relation to the signer of the Declaration of Independence but no less of a patriot - lived in a tony, progressive neighborhood of Washington, a stone's throw from the White House now occupied by Donald Trump. 

 

The neighborhood, University Park by name, was the home to lawyers, non-profit managers, educators, and doctors, all of whom displayed Hate Has No Home Here, Black Lives Matter, and Biden-Harris lawn signs, who voted in lockstep for the Democratic Party and the most liberal members of the City Council.  

PTA meetings were all about diversity and inclusivity, and residents often hosted black-white get-togethers where black teachers from the inner city on special assignment to all-white Jarvis Elementary were entertained and feted for bringing the reality of urban life to racially homogeneous Ward 3. 

Casual conversations on Alling Street were more often than not about the devil downtown, the new resident of 1700 Pennsylvania, the despot-in-waiting, the usurper, the tyrant.  No introductions were needed on Alling Street, for all engaged were of the same stripe.  It was simply assumed that one was a member of the tribe, the clan, the group.  Who of friends and neighbors could possibly be a Trump supporter, a Republican, and a conservative? And so without hesitation, the chat turned to Trump's latest lies, fraud, and misinformation.

Hancock nodded to the assertions made - convictions long past any reasonable reflection and in autopilot mode - but he increasingly had difficulty in holding his tongue since to his neighbors the re-election of the President, tantamount to electing Beelzebub himself, was an unconscionable, unthinkable turn of events; and therefore prompted the most cockamamie, out-of-left-field impressions of deformed governance and irreparably immoral residence. 

The gym, the library, the coffee shop were no different - places of settled opinion, communal grief, and redoubts of resistance.  In fact there was nowhere he could go to feel himself, let loose some of the enthusiasm for Trump and the imminent social remake; so as a gesture of personal pique, he wore a red Rappahannock Oyster hat, a MAGA hat for all intents and purposes, to all venues. 

The looks, the raised eyebrows, the insolent stares were worth wearing the ill-fitting, now fish-stained cap, bought years ago on the dock of the Bay one summer afternoon overlooking Carter's Creek.

'Could it be?' was the irrepressible look on the face of his coffee mates, gym buddies, and library fellows.  Some mistake surely, not in this neighborhood; but there it was as plain as day, an apostate, a denier, a...words failed the crowd at this unexpected vision.  In Mississippi certainly. In Iowa perhaps, and in the redwoods of Humboldt County very likely, but here in Northwest Washington?

Mary Beth Barnum, a retired school teacher and volunteer for the Harris campaign and her husband Nick, a midlevel manager somewhere in Maryland, had been friends of the Hancocks for years; but the diapers and PTA meetings which had long held their interest, were long gone.  The Barnums could simply not countenance the harshly conservative views of their neighbor.  

Perhaps it was all for show - John was simply being John - but finally over limp chicken and stiff broccolini (Mary Beth had never been able to cook her way out of pot roast and mashed potatoes) he let fly with a virtual torrent of invective, twists of irony, and an outright vaudevillian ad hominem slaughtering of leftist cant.  

The Barnums were stunned. They spluttered and splat, but could not regain their footing after such a dinner table assault. 'Get over it', John advised as Mary Beth and Nick fought for traction. 

‘Why did you do that?', asked John's wife Prudence hours later.  'They are lifelong friends'.  Yes indeed, but now after the trash pickups and playground stories, supernumerary at best, and the very epitome of political hothouse insularity, it was time for a change. 

 

Fighting for purchase, the hopelessly outgunned Mary Beth sputtered some inane response about 'propriety' and 'the rule of law'; but neither she nor her deer-in-the-headlights husband could possibly get their heads around the Trump revival, the absolute negation and dismissal of progressive fantasy.

'But....how...when...' and other gurgling attempts at coherence were lost in the treacly soft jazz piped in on Sonos. 

John immediately regretted the episode.  Although there was as much chance of reasonable response from the Barnums as a June Bug in December, he should have kept his own counsel, retreated, and kept still; but the time felt right.  Coming out of the closet felt good and imperative.  It was only a shame that it was the poor, clueless Barnums that had to feel the full brunt of his Trump fidelity. 

There was no point whatsoever in flogging a dead horse.  His compatriots, neighbors, co-workers, and friends had become so instinctively upset by every little thing, so incensed at America's plunge into systemic racism, misogyny, and homophobia, that there was no pulling them out of the well.  There they were consigned to howl and moan while the nation moved on. 

'Nice hat', said a gym buddy still nursing his wounds after the Trump election and yet to come to grips with the Anschluss over at USAID and the mobilization at Education, HHS, and Energy.  What more could he say, confronted by the unthinkable.  He had been locker mates with Hancock for years and engaged him in small talk and pleasantries for years; but now, there he was with a MAGA hat, and insulting in-your-face slap, a rejection of all hopefulness and honesty.  

'Thanks', said Hancock, who troddled off off to the ellipticals without much of a second thought to the stares and wonder of his gym rat buddies. 

They would never get it because they did not want to - it was not that they were stupid as such, just so mired in a caressing, embracing happy intellectual provincialism that they could not even consider something other than a wonderful life in a progressive commune. 

So the faux MAGA Rappahannock Oyster Company hat stayed. Hancock, energized by the Trump Anschluss into USAID territory, lorded it over friends and neighbors.  An extra American flag flew from the Hancock balcony.  The time for quiet rectitude was over.  These jerks had a comeuppance coming, and why not from him?

There was no point whatsoever in flogging a dead horse.  His compatriots, neighbors, co-workers, and friends had become so instinctively upset by every little thing, so incensed at America's plunge into systemic racism, misogyny, and homophobia, that there was no pulling them out of the well.  There they were consigned to howl and moan while the nation moved on. 

'Nice hat', said a gym buddy still nursing his wounds after the Trump election and yet to come to grips with the Anschluss over at USAID and the mobilization at Education, HHS, and Energy.  What more could he say, confronted by the unthinkable.  He had been locker mates with Hancock for years and engaged him in small talk and pleasantries for years; but now, there he was with a MAGA hat, and insulting in-your-face slap, a rejection of all hopefulness and honesty.  

'Thanks', said Hancock, who troddled off off to the ellipticals without much of a second thought to the stares and wonder of his gym rat buddies. 

They would never get it because they did not want to - it was not that they were stupid as such, just so mired in a caressing, embracing happy intellectual provincialism that they could not even consider something other than a wonderful life in a Soviet commune. 

So the faux MAGA Rappahannock Oyster Company hat stayed. Hancock, energized by the Trump Anschluss into USAID territory, lorded it over friends and neighbors.  An extra American flag flew from the Hancock balcony.  The time for quiet rectitude was over.  These jerks had a comeuppance coming, and why not from him?