Feeling blue in a red town

I was driving to church Sunday, and my car was making a weird rattling sound. I am classically female and non-mechanical (not to imply that there are no mechanical women out there; I’m just not one of them). The sound emanated from the back right area, and I thought the door might not be closed completely.

Just then a man honked at me and did the roll-down your window sign (which is funny, because most windows are automated now).

Waiting for my latest rebuke, (I tend to drive the speed limit, which annoys people) I heard instead, “Hey! Even though you’re a Democrat, I feel compelled to let you know your back right tire is leaking air.”

“Even though you’re a Republican, I sincerely thank you,” I said, and turned back toward a tire shop.

The incident got me thinking, and I pondered the larger meaning of this encounter. As a former English teacher, I look for symbolism in everything. Ask any of my former students. They’ll nod bitterly, knowing my brain will morph this incident into writing prompt.

“Ms. Clark,” the class spokesperson will plead, “there is no symbolism in this man’s helping you. Please don’t make us write about it.”

“Au contraire,” I’d respond. “This encounter says a lot about American political life in 2005.”

I’d go on to ask them if they realized what a deeply divided and hostile country America has become. The fact that this man was kind enough to help me in spite of my John Kerry sticker is significant.

We live in an area that is predominantly conservative and Christian, and I can be having a great conversation with someone until we bring up politics. Then the talk can turn nasty, and the conversational temperature will drop 10 degrees.

As of this writing, state propositions have been slapped down; government high-ups are being investigated for alleged crimes, and people hate me when I say I’m a liberal.

Speaking of political negativity, I’d like to go on record that the Kerry sticker was actually more a vote against Bush, and I decided to keep it on my car after the election as a reminder to people that I didn’t vote for George W. I had a sticker in the front window of my house, but I removed it, feeling uneasy about someone throwing a rock into it.

I was talking to the other liberal in the area and we realized we were speaking in hushed tones. My friend in Minnesota and I were also talking this kind of talk and then thought, “What if the government hears our cell phone conversation?”

Paranoid? Just try being a minister preaching against the war, and then having the IRS investigate your church’s nonprofit status.

By now my students would be yawning, and I’d say, “What if you have to go to Iraq?”

“Nah,” the good students would say. “I’ll be in college. Besides, the war will be over by then.”

The struggling students would want to enlist, and I don’t blame them. For some, the military is a way out of chaotic families, a chance to be trained or go to college. The trade-off would be dying, of course.

I’d tell them of a recent conversation I’d had with a staff member at school the day after Bush won his second term. We were friends.

She smiled smugly at me, knowing I was, as the kids say, “bummed.” We looked at each other as if across a large chasm. My bad mood got the best of me, and I said, “Yes. He won. I’m sad. Let’s move on.”

But I could not resist adding, “How are you going to feel if your son has to go to Iraq?” He’s 21 and in college.

She was unconcerned.

“He’ll be in medical school by then.”

When I go to my church, its banner brazenly announces, “Welcome to a liberal church.” It also proclaims its goal to help others who are weak, ill, disadvantaged or poor. I have never felt more comfortable in a church, because truly, I feel like a stranger in a strange land living here. But I worry that they use the “L” word. I hope it doesn’t get them into trouble.

I had put my daughter’s old Maxima out in front of my house with a for sale sign on it. A man had called and wanted to see it, but in the meantime my friend Dave had bought it and was driving over to have me help him bring it home. As we were standing by the car, a man came roaring up and said he wanted to buy the car. When I told him it was already sold, he looked at Dave’s Kerry sticker and flew into a rage.

The cleanest part of his rant still isn’t publishable. He sped away, still shouting at us.

Dave laughed and found it highly amusing. I didn’t. I tried to keep the kind man who had told me about my tire in mind. One-on-one we all still get along.

But, as Thomas Paine said, “These are the times that try men’s soul.”

I feel uneasy. Do you?

* SUE CLARK lives in Costa Mesa and is a therapist in Newport Beach. She can be reached at tallteacher@comcast.net.

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