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{*Editor’s Note: “Stop covering politics,” some of our dear readers cry every time we post something relephant. Look: politics are life. We can’t ignore what’s happening, and you shouldn’t either. Empathy rises from knowing, not ignoring. As Trungpa Rinpoche noted, “Compassion automatically invites you to relate with people because you no longer regard people as a drain on your energy.” We can afford to do more than “I’m gonna ignore the news and hope all this blows over” and “good vibes only” mentality. Disagree with this perspective? We’re happy to share your experience here.}
It’s A Gray Area
There is a debate of trivial consequence that has plagued my household for years.
The controversy…the color of our loft’s concrete floors.
I told you it was trivial, but stay with me here. My husband believes our floors are brown. I am certain they are gray. The dispute has become so heated at times, that we once took a poll of our friends and families, not surprisingly, the people were split. We are no closer to ratifying the debate’s conclusion than we are close to peace in the middle east. And we see how well that’s going.
It seems fairly black and white to me—pun inserted here on purpose—though I’ve tried to see it from my husband’s viewpoint, going so far as looking at our floors at different times of day: in full sunshine, under cloudy skies, in variant lighting. But the results are always the same.
The floors are gray and my husband is wrong.
The strange disagreement has led me to examine all the ways people differ so strongly from one another in their convictions, even when presented with facts. Facts are a funny thing though, and are often bent and stretched to fit one’s narrative. Many of us turn a blind eye to the facts when they don’t align with our chosen truth. The eyes never lie, so we think. But how about our minds, do our minds ever lie, do they ever hide the truth from us? What if what we are debating is not color but democracy?
Color blindness is a real condition, is there such a thing as political blindness? Decency blindness?
I can best demonstrate this thought with an example. It’s a lofty one. My mistake, two examples. They involve the recent killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by ICE agents. We’ve all seen the videos. From every angle the truth moves sharply into position. There is only one position, Renee Good and Alex Pretti were unjustly killed.
So why does this administration continue to say ICE acted in self-defense?
Why does our government continue to lie to our faces when our eyes have seen the truth?
All while ICE agents continue to be reminded by our government of their federal immunity. What’s this, a permission slip to kill at whim?
The eyes never lie, right? But do our allegiances lead us astray, compelling some of us to see brown when things are actually gray?
Can multiple realities exist at once? Certainly multiple interpretations do. Is the truth really found somewhere in the middle? If my husband and I were to meet in compromise, we might agree to land on taupe as the color of our floors. Brown and gray make taupe, so the color wheel says. Our floors are not taupe.
I pose a lot of questions here. The answers float somewhere above our capacity to metabolize them. Human nature continues to mystify, some humans more bewildering than others. But facts are facts, and when confronted with irrefutable information, it is our duty as people, as neighbors, as Americans, to stand up and declare the truth. We must veer from party lines and step into our integrity to protect each other, to protect democracy, to protect the truth.
Let’s not let our eyes deceive us.
Is the truth really open to interpretation? Not where Renee Good and Alex Pretti are concerned. I stand firm.
But in other matters I find there is room for someone else’s truth to exist alongside my own. A blurred taupe piñata, if you will. One I’d like to slam with a baseball bat from time to time.
The color debate at home has morphed into a running joke between me and my husband. We do our best to respect each other’s views, and vision. True emotional maturity can be measured by how we interact with loved ones who see things differently than us. I love the hell out of some republicans, I married one. I’d be lying though if I said I understood their choices. I do not.
Still, there are some matters I respectfully decline to compromise on. They include: the hyperbole of the 2020 “stolen” election, Trump’s encouraged January 6 insurrection, the murder of Renee Good, the murder of Alex Pretti. And the color of our home’s floors. They’re gray, honey. That’s just a fact.
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