Nasty People

 

by Pa Rock

Survivor

I was in town yesterday in a publicly-funded building sitting in a private room having a conversation with a representative from the Area Agency on Aging as she guided me through the upcoming year's enrollment in the Medicare Part D (prescription drugs) program.  I meet with the same woman every year in the same public building, and she is always very helpful in assisting me to obtain the best deal on the program that helps me afford all of my many meds throughout the year.

(If you haven't noticed, the cost of being old is going up markedly.  Last year she found a program for me that was less than ten dollars a month out-of-pocket.  Wowzer!   The same program for next year has risen to nearly $45 a month and it no longer covers three of my important medications, so we had to come up with something else.  The best and most affordable option turned out to be a plan that runs just over $90 a month - a raise of 800%.  I'm not expecting things to get better under the next President who doesn't have to worry about the cost of his meds and is unlikely to worry about the cost of mine.)

The lady from the Area Agency on Aging had borrowed a room for the afternoon from a publicly-funded agency that deals with old people.  When I entered the small room I neglected to close the door, which was alright because it was stuffy anyway and we were neither one loud people.  But as we sat at the table trying to conduct our business, two women showed up and sat down outside of the open door.    And although they were speaking softly, they were just loud enough that one could not avoid tuning in on their conversation.

The first thing the Old Dears did was to congratulate each other on Kamala's loss on the previous day.  Then thy proceeded to get nasty.

"Democrats are such nasty people," one said.

"Yes, they are nasty,"  her friend replied.

"And did you see that they carried Colorado and New Mexico?  Those are nasty states."

"Yes, I saw that, too."

"And Democrat cities.  Those really are very nasty."

"Yes, they are so nasty."

Of course, if you were replace the word "Democrats" with "Blacks" you would have had the complete and unfiltered meaning of what they were really trying to communicate to each other.

When they started harping on Democratic cities, I realized that I was more focused on their drivel than I was on the important information that the lady from the Area Agency on Aging was trying to impart.  "Would you care if I closed the door?"  I asked, politely.

"I'll do it," she replied quickly and got up and shut out the racket.

I'm old enough to remember when people did not just routinely refer to others as being "nasty," but I realize how we have gotten to that point - and I know specifically who to blame.   The United States of America is a nastier place than it was just a few years ago, and basically one man is to blame.  His incivility and vulgarity has infected us all,  even me and two two nasty old biddies who sat in the hallway yesterday sharpening their good Christian tongues on the nastiness of Democrats.

As I was driving out of the parking lot after the meeting, a pickup truck being driven by a young man roared past with a large flag flapping in the breeze.  It was one-half of an American flag connected to one-half of a Confederate flag.   The nasty young man driving the vehicle was obviously celebrating something!