Preparing for 2019

By Faith Chatham - January 1, 2019

It is 2019. What are the most important things to experience and accomplish this year? What must be done to for each of us to individually enjoy what we want to enjoy, and to accomplish what we want to accomplish?

For me, one thing on my to do list is cleaning the kitchen. I let things slide when I'm involved in causes or projects. The exterminators treated the apt. while I was in San Antonio. Everything is out of the cabinets. I've been running the dishwasher continuously since getting home. Each load of dishes placed in a recently cleaned cupboard shelf, each tray of silver arranged, instead of hastily flung into a drawer, moves me closer toward being ready to proceed with the new year. By the end of today, the kitchen and dining area will be probably be in better shape than it will probably be any other time in the coming year. Then I will move to bedroom closets. Hopefully within a week this rare obsession with orderliness will spill over into the studio.

I am not a tidy spic and span priority person. I live in creative, mental, research, literary, political and artistic worlds. When in those creative zones, I am oblivious to food, clocks, germs, clutter, sleep. So, whenever a rare spell of obsessive straightening and scrubbing overshadows me, I try to ride it as long, and as far, as it can be sustained, because it may be months before it enters my door again. The longer it remains outside, the harder it gets to find space to work inside.

This year there is lots of work to be done. I feel characters, images, causes, and projects pushing to get out.

There are relics here of people and causes I respect and value. I still have evidence of activism in Ready for Hillary and Hillary 2016 intermingled with 2018 buttons for Lupe, Kim, Terry, Gina, MJ, Vikki, Victoria, Shirley, Sheryl, Sylvia, Rhetta, Beverly, Ana Maria and others scattered about.

It is nice to see that the phrases on cards and posters have changed from messaging in 2014. Then we were trying to help Texans understand how few Dems, minorities, veterans and women Texans sent to Congress. We need to acknowledge the scope of a problem before we can inspire enough people to help change it. Now the messages are targeting getting specific Democrats, specific women, specific veterans, specific minorities elected to office.

This year, despite the harm wrought by Donald Trump and his enablers, we have victories to celebrate. On Jan. 3rd in DC over 100 women will be seated in the US House when the new Congress is sworn in.  I look forward to being in the gallery of the Texas Capitol Jan 8th to see friends seated as newly elected Senators and State Representatives. We've made progress. We have a long way to go. Now we have a few more warriors in place to watch the backs of the ethical and brave and to carry the torch in legislative relays.

I want 2019 to be more than just the year when we share our stories and say "Me Too!' I want it to be the year when those who enable or refuse to pursue and punish serial rapists are removed. This should be the year when instead of 1 out of 3 women and 1 out of 5 men being survivors, it becomes the year when the majority of perpetrators are stopped and prevented from every violating any boy or girl, man or woman every again. Instead of #METOO I want to see #ZeroTolerance.

I truly hope and pray that the Trump administration comes to a speedy, and abrupt end. We need to rid this nation, and our psyche, from the excesses, corruption and violation of that man and his henchmen and enablers. I hope both Trump and Pence are nothing more than a footnote by March of this year. We need to push the RESET button and begin anew. These are some of the things which are on my heart. They are goals and causes worth working for, worth enduring clutter and other inconveniences to accomplish jointly with others who care and sacrifice. Caring also means helping worthy people have the means to step forward to run for office and to win in 2020. Those of us who are older owe it to those who protected and nurtured us when we were young and to those who are younger and deserve to be nurtured and mentored.