The Coffee Table

On the Wrong Side

I subscribe to a major national newspaper that I peruse daily. But some days (often) I can’t stomach much. When the proverbial excrement hits the fan, producing headlines that indicate I’ve been unwittingly transported back to the McCarthy era, I need to read something that makes sense. About things I can control. It’s then that I turn to advice columns: Miss Manners, Carolyn Hax, Asking Eric, Dear Abby.

Miss Manners tells me it’s important to write thank you notes. Carolyn Hax says when I’m considering moving in with a partner whose financial situation is other than mine, we must have open conversations about how our economics will affect the structure of our relationship—or our relationship will forever be imbalanced and might come apart.  

I am already a great fan of writing thank yous and have no plans to live with anybody other than my dog and cat (with whom I acknowledge an imbalanced relationship given that the law makes me responsible for their behavior). But I enjoy these columnists’ suggestions for reasonably resolving dilemmas that theoretically belong to real people.

I know the bulk of advice columnists are not trained certified therapists with advanced degrees in the study of human behavior. But the topics they publicly address are human ones. Generally of the sort ordinary people deal with.   

I mean, when is the last time you were so angry at a comedian dissing you and your cronies on national television that you arranged to have his job eliminated? That is extraordinary. And rash. I wish our president and his minions would write to advice columnists about thank you notes, economic disparities, and maybe even just being a good neighbor—except they apparently don’t give a snit about how others feel.   

But, then again, maybe I should take my own advice.

Dear Carolyn—

I am a citizen of a country that was formerly a democracy. A nation where, if you are on the right side of things, you get rewarded, and if you are on the left, er, I mean… wrong side, you are ignored at best, or worse—threatened, sued, censored, fired, arrested, beaten, deported and/or imprisoned. This is true even in death:  If you are on the right, you get a statesman’s burial, even if you weren’t technically a statesman. If you are on the wrong side, your elected leader doesn’t demonstrate an iota of sympathy. Not even a “thank you for your service” if you were a Democratic official in the state of Minnesota, gunned down in cold blood.

I have operated in good faith. I vote in every election and have never thrown a tantrum just because my candidate didn’t win. I write respectful letters to my representatives, expressing my views without questioning their sanity or using profanity, and I always thank them for their attention to the topic at hand. But, still, I live in fear that things have become so imbalanced that the guarantees inherent in my nation’s constitution are no longer guaranteed, at all. I am at a loss as to how to proceed as the patriotic citizen I have always considered myself to be, without fear of retribution. 

I know you might suggest attending therapy—and I’d be willing, if I could afford it. But I don’t think my leaders will do likewise—despite their wealth. In fact, they are apt to make professional help more and more difficult for economically challenged citizens to obtain. I want to honor my elected officials, but it’s grueling. Please tell me what I can do to salvage these relationships.

—On the Wrong Side