The Iron Curtain

It isn’t easy to see an old friend lose his way and stumble off down a path you don’t wish to follow and Tuesday’s vote has given me pause. The world inhabited by Trump and his voters isn’t my world. The America I emigrated to was already in transition away from a reaction to the Great Depression and World War Two into a new era of do your own thing and be self reliant. I edged into it and have enjoyed the ride. 

Now as I start the last part of my journey through life I find America has veered so far from the values of my youth, brought up in the shadow of 20th century violence and desolation, determined to do better, and accustomed to a world where decency and middle class solidarity were expected if not always reciprocated, I find myself on the sidelines of a social revolution I don’t understand. 

A huge number of my fellow Americans have got together to elect a President whose values are so far from mine I don’t see my connection to the America I love anymore. To describe veterans as suckers and losers, to describe a riot in which police officers were killed and injured as a day of love, to show no respect to women, the handicapped, gays and racial minorities and to use religion as a cynical political tool, and take time to appease foreign dictators, none of these things represent my values. 

But it is evident they do represent the values of the bulk of my neighbors. Trump is the expression of a national movement of fear that leaves me bewildered. The US I have inhabited has been a place of possibilities and triumphs, failures and happy chances, I have never seen the dystopian world described by Trump of horror and bloodbaths and immigrants like me killing pets and sodomizing children under pizza parlors. I am not a fan of politicians nor would I wish to be one. Some are terrible and some are decent and like most human endeavors they balance each other out and things get done albeit messily and slowly. Politics always used to be the Art of the Possible, the compromises that left everyone slightly pleased and somewhat  frustrated but pulling together. Under Trump division and fear mongering are the political rules to live by. 

Now we have a president elect promising firing squads and retribution. The privacy and separation of church and state is crumbling and the promise of a fresh opportunity to vote and change course in four years does not seem certain. These are not my values. Politics and religion and bank accounts are private things and in polite society these subjects don’t come up but here I am, feeling forced to take a stand for values that used to seem as natural as breathing in my youth and now are points of contention in a contentious world. 

I find it hugely ironic to find myself in South America at this critical time, the land par excellence of bribery corruption and violent politics, a byword for political instability and dictatorship. After we left the US the Clay County registrar of elections said we didn’t qualify for a ballot as we don’t have a physical address. We were too far away to remedy this DeSantis inspired drive to purge the voting rolls and found ourselves stateless at this strange pivot point. Perhaps marking myself a Democrat didn’t help when the very red county officials decided to purge me but there we are, everything is now judged by your political stripe. I take comfort from the fact that in Florida the die was long since cast and every single expression of deviation from the Trump playbook was voted down and never came close. When I first became a citizen voting was encouraged, a non partisan civic duty, now it is a cause for law enforcement to say publicly you won’t get protection when you need it if you aren’t a member of The Party. Holy Soviet corruption Batman! And the officer responsible got suspended for a day.  This America is too bizarre for me. 

I don’t know what to think, far less what to do, an old man whose government pension is now under threat, who fears to speak publicly and freely, whose Jewish wife heard the stories of swastikas painted on the walls of the family business in Illinois in that awful distant decade we promised we would never forget. 

As I travel through countries whose commitment to decency and democracy is under constant threat I find myself ashamed that I too now come from a country that is no better. If you don’t like it the Trumpists say, then leave it. Well perhaps they are right; we are in no hurry to return at this point. 

I miss my America and I always will. It was great while it lasted. 

As to the pension issue: 

Beach Photos

Sunday By The Sea

Sunday morning dawned cool and dry in Los Molinos up the coast forty minutes from Valdivia. My first imperative after around nights sleep to the sounds of crashing waves was to a) brush my teeth or b) walk the impatient bloody dog. A) won out but it was close. 

It looked like a stray dog but she was just mooching around on the waterfront. I saw these dogs go to their gates to be let in when they felt like it. Rusty tolerated her on the beach for a while. His eye is healing nicely with me putting drops on it and shoving pills down his unwilling throat. Our neighbors in the completely unstealthy travel trailer were still sleeping. 

We had Los Molinos to ourselves!  Freedom! Except for the two local dogs annoying Rusty by being nice to him.  

Oh and there was rain in the offing, it turned out lots of slashing rain and wind. But first we walked. 

Sunday morning trash collection. I was impressed. 

Chilean campers stayed here in the turnout (“No Parking”) but we didn’t see them. 

This guy was waiting for someone to come open his gate: 

I didn’t get the doghouses; they were empty of dog but had cardboard on the floor with blankets on top, and where I used to feel bad for dogs outside in what seems cold temperatures to me, I’ve  seen Rusty spending lots of time, by his choice, curled up outside so I guess I need to be less critical. 

Personally I don’t see the point of having a dog if you don’t share your life with him but Chileans don’t all view it that way. “He’s from the United States?” they ask and I reply that he speaks English too. The kids freak when I ask them if they speak English and they shake their heads and I say: “He does.” They stare at him while their parents smile. Oh and please don’t steal the flowers. 

And then we drove out of town. I wanted to go back up the coast and see what might be what. iOverlander has lots of wild camping on the beach but that didn’t look appealing as the rain slashed down. We intended to drive the red line up the coast. Los Molinos is the blue dot.

In the end we got as far as Curiñanco when we decided to turn around. The drive was interesting and the coastline is wild. It was not what we expected so the drive was worthwhile.

If this isn’t technically Patagonia it feels like what I expected Patagonia to feel like and I fear we will have to get used to rain drops interfering with my photos through the windshield. 

Apparently this area is part of an indigenous freedom movement which likes to decorate bus stops with slogans demanding freedom for the Mapuche. 

I wondered if that was how the coast remained so pristine with no high rises or big hotels. And still no trash. 

I took a screen shot of some southern cities’ weather forecasts in Chile and Argentina. Summer is coming …

We are learning to enjoy this and are decidedly glad we have a van for a home. A tent or a pop top would be rough for tropical wussies like us. 

The blue sky is a product of the windshield sun shade. The sun was not available around Valdivia yesterday. 

We ended up camping two nights across the bay on the waterfront. 

We stopped for brunch in the parking lot of a ferry service that takes cars across the river mouth to the south. 

I couldn’t see much to visit on the south side of the river and the ferry was doing a pretty imitation of a bucking bronco in midstream. No boat trip necessary. 

Wind and waves. 

I thought this looked rather like the Columbia River. 

We planned a trip to a maritime museum but it is closed Sunday and Monday. Then we drove to the Museum of Anthropology which was supposed to be open. It actually looked abandoned. The sign said “Kiss and Go” which I liked. We paused to consider our next move in the big city of 150,000 people. Valdivia was not coming through for us. 

Layne wanted to take a river boat tour but that impulse died with the rain and wind. It was the city waterfront market that saved the day. Rusty and I stayed aboard and watched people huddling from the downpour. 

Layne gave me these pictures of her shopping for smoked salmon cheese and some other stuff. 

Back up to the coast to park for an afternoon of reading, writing my blog and movie watching. 

Life on the road in what may well be Patagonia.