I MIGHT BE A BABBLING IDIOT…. BUT SO ARE YOU (these ducks used to be pretty tight until 2020)

By Teresa McIntosh-Hall

You think I am a babbling idiot because I post about the importance of getting the COVID vaccination. 

I think you’re a babbling idiot because you post AGAINST getting the COVID vaccination.

 So where exactly does that leave us?  We eventually have to meet somewhere in the middle…in that difficult and dark space called “let’s drink our beer and not talk about it tonight.”  But you can only hang out in the club for so long until the lights come on.

Cheers. Head nod, wink, fist bump. Party is over. Truth time.

What I learned during the Trump years is that even the most solid friendships can be tested and put on rocky ground when we stand firm in our convictions. Nothing has divided us more as a country than the following three topics…Trump, Race and COVID.

It’s human nature to desire the company of people who see the world the way we do.  Sure, it’s entertaining to argue with a stranger at 1:00 AM in your bed, on your laptop and while chomping on a bag of Fritos, about why Trump is a certified sociopath but try that same argument with your friend in broad daylight who flies a Trump flag on her front porch on Friday night and brings you a box of crispy crème donuts on Saturday morning. 

How do you say….”go f*ck yourself Karen” and “thank you, Karen” in the same week to someone you love without experiencing some cognitive dissonance?

I lost one good, funny, loving friend of 25 years during the Trump election season.  I knew her before she was a mother and a football mom. Before she gave a damn about politics. I knew her in a way that most in our small town do not. But one eventful evening, I made the choice to block her on social media.  Cut her off.  Squash the 25-year-old friendship with one click of the mouse. It was right before I typed and then erased the following sentence….

I’ve. Had. Enough. Of. Your. Fake. Condescending.  Ass.  

Delete. Delete. Delete.

 Unfriend.

Computer shuts down. “F*ck you Karen” I mumbled as my head hit the pillow. The gloves were off. 

A complete stranger can call me every name in the book on a public forum and I’ll still sleep like a baby but damn it stings like a bee when someone you love and trust suddenly carves you into a hundred little insignificant pieces with cutting words and secret memes. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I wasn’t. I guess I wasn’t sure. Maybe it was my fault. Maybe I was being too sensitive. Maybe grown adults are just as immature as little kids sometimes. Maybe we both crossed some lines.

Did I make the right decision to end the friendship? I don’t know to be honest.  All I know is that every interaction I had with her during the political season left me feeling hurt and misunderstood. It left me feeling that she didn’t love me nearly as much as I loved her. Maybe she didn’t love me at all. And yes, I use the word love because you can love your friends as much as family when you’ve known them for 25 years.

I watched as she aligned herself with the very people she once called “fake” and “townies”…suddenly these were her people.  Never mind that I defended her at a party in the presence of a few of them fake f*ckers.  Before the election of course. Before she started selling Trump flags and found religion. Notice I said religion and not God.  Because there is a big difference.  

And now I am left wondering…how is my old friend doing?  Is the Trump flag still flying from her porch? Did she get vaccinated? Did she have enough sense to protect herself or is she perhaps still promoting anti-vaccination theories just as strongly as she promoted Trump?  I think I know what the answer is and it’s not good. 

The question is this…is she a fool, or am I?  It all depends on who you ask.

She is convinced the election was rigged. In her mind, against all proof, Trump won.  You can’t convince her otherwise. Odds are she is also convinced the vaccination is dangerous and part of a bigger conspiracy. Never mind the fact that Trump himself took the vaccine. Never mind science. Never mind the fact that 4 billion people have safely received the vaccination. Never mind the fact that 99% of the people dying from COVID are unvaccinated.  Forget history. Forget smallpox. Forget polio. Forget that they lined us up in the school gymnasium in 1976 and made us take a mandatory small pox vaccination and none of us were crying like little babies.  Our parents weren’t raising hell. We sucked it up. We got it done. We trusted our country and our leaders.  We survived. We were not screaming that the sky was falling. We took our damn shots like Americans!  OOH-RAH!

People seem to forget that the reason we live so long in this modern age is due to advancements in science, NOT advancements in conspiracy theories.

Name JUST ONE conspiracy theory that has saved the world or improved humanity.  Now name some scientific advancements that have. 

I’ll do it for you before you hit the google search engine…vaccinations, handwashing, wells for water, toilets for sanitation, insulin, anesthesia, antibiotics, sunscreen, air conditioning, CPR, air bags, seat belts, satellites, blood transfusions, pasteurization, radiology, pacemakers, eye glasses, hearing aids, cochlear implants, Ice cold perfect temperature McDonald’s coke in an insulated cup.   

Notice that “Marilyn Monroe was murdered” is not on this list. Neither is Big Foot. 

History will look upon these anti-vaccination times in the same way that most of us look at a Big Foot sighting.

 “What the hell were they thinking” our grandchildren will ask? 

And someone will say “Well Grandpa was convinced that Big Foot was locked up at a Pfizer laboratory and they tested out the COVID vaccine on him and he escaped and ended up in China when he was slaughtered at the fish and meat market and now they want us to take the same vaccine that they injected into Big Foot!  Grandpa wasn’t having any of it!”

Grandpa said “over my dead body.”

And well…that’s how it ended actually.  Over his dead body.

Yep, my dear old Trump loving, anti-COVID vaccination friend went deep and head first into the rabbit hole in 2020 and I haven’t seen or heard from her since.

I admit that I miss her.  

I look for her on sunny days.  In a box of cookies. In a sunset picture. On a plastic donut plate.  In a stream of fireworks over the city.  In a rubber duck floating down the river.  Across the stadium.  In a funny joke or punchline. In a midnight text that reads “are you up?”   But it’s never her.

I look for her but she is gone to that place that friendships go when they run the test of time. It’s a sad place really. I’ve been told I am not alone. That many friendships ended in the Trump era. It’s sad really… especially considering how few true friends there are in the world. You would think we would hold tightly to those we have.

Despite our petty political differences, I wish her a lifetime of love and abundance… and I hope someday she climbs out of the rabbit hole and takes down that orange, butt ugly Trump flag that smells like rotten ass. She won’t though. She will fly it to spite me. It’s how she rolls. I can relate.

But most of all I hope she gets vaccinated because I am pretty good at blogging but I am really bad at writing eulogies.  She knows this too.

Eulogies always end the same ole sad way. 

Cue the tears.  Cue the preacher. Cue the speech from the family…” she was loved.  Yes, she was. She was the best mother ever. Yes, she really was. She sacrificed for everyone. Yes, she did. She would do anything for any of her friends or family. True dat.” 

Cue the speech from her long-lost, big mouth liberal friend….” She had terrible taste in politicians. She liked her McDonald’s Coke very cold and in an insulated cup and that crazy b*tch made me drive 10 miles out of my way in Tennessee to get her 50 of those damn insulated cups and now that………….”  

This is where the family escorts the crazy friend from the podium.

Get vaccinated my friend. 

And may the next election season bring us all peace, prosperity and good health.

By Teresa McIntosh-Hall