Stop Trump! – Cathy's Blog!

Posted on September 15, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Gratitude

This morning when I read of another of Trump’s tantrums, this one with the Supreme Court, members he appointed to obey him, rather than to honor the law, common sense, and their own conscience, I remembered when my very young son spouted: “You’re not the boss of me.”

He was proclaiming his individuality which is essential and important, and he was learning he was a child in a family, in a community, so his proclaimed autonomy fit into a larger world, one meant to protect and integrate him. He was a part of a whole.

Trump views himself as a king with unlimited powers. He doesn’t know the constitution, doesn’t know the Declaration of Independence. He doesn’t seem to know or care that there are three branches of government, Legislative, Executive, and Judicial, created to balance one person’s ego and corruption. And so now we endure another temper tantrum.

An unknown friend goes back through my blog and likes posts from the past. His likes bring me to past posts, and today I’m with a post from November 23, 2021 titled Gratitude. I was celebrating the honoring of gratitude as more than one day of Thanksgiving. I wrote:

This is the week designated for gratitude. The light spreads its rays as though we are meant to climb out of ourselves into connection with a wider world. We can also be grateful for who and what we are, this wonderful assemblage in time and space.

Alan Watts:

WHAT I AM REALLY SAYING IS THAT YOU DON’T NEED TO DO ANYTHING, BECAUSE IF YOU SEE YOURSELF IN THE CORRECT WAY, YOU ARE ALL AS MUCH EXTRAORDINARY PHENOMENON OF NATURE AS TREES, CLOUDS, THE PATTERNS IN RUNNING WATER, THE FLICKERING OF FIRE, THE ARRANGEMENT OF THE STARS, AND THE FORM OF A GALAXY. YOU ARE ALL JUST LIKE THAT, AND THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH YOU AT ALL.

May Trump one day learn the wisdom that makes us Whole!

Posted on September 13, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Non-violence

Today I’m contemplating Mahatma Gandhi and what he accomplished with his commitment to non-violence. He led the resistance that led to India’s independence from British rule. I think these times are requiring us to do the same, to honor non-violence as we resist this intended takeover by those who care only about making themselves even wealthier than they already are.

The 14th Dalai Lama tells the story of a Tibetan monk who spent 18 years in a Chinese prison labor camp. When asked about the dangers he faced during this time of torture, confinement, and abuse, he replied that his only true danger was the risk of losing compassion for his captors.

These examples are inspiring. It may not seem we’re facing such challenges, but things are changing rapidly. It is to be aware and prepare.

The water in the fountain rises and falls, rises and falls.

Posted on September 12, 2026September 12, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Love

I’m starting this post with a quote from Thornton Wilder in The Bridge of San Luis Rey, a book I read periodically. I believe in the power of Love.

There is a land of the living and a land

of the dead and the bridge is love, the

only survival, the only meaning.

With that, I suggest everyone read Heather Cox Richardson words for today, September 12. She begins with this:

On Thursday, in The New Republic, conservative judge J. Michael Luttig published a dire warning to the Republican Party…and to all Americans. In the piece, Luttig outlined how Republicans could refuse to seat elected Democrats in January after a Democratic victory in the 2026 midterm elections of November. “The coming crisis,” the piece says, would be “The Final Battle for America’s Democracy.”

Luttig spelled out that Trump is fighting a war against America’s democracy. While the refusal of Vice President Mike Pence to assist his power grab made it fail in January 2021, Luttig notes, today Trump and his Republican congressional allies are more determined than ever to take over the country.

Luttig focuses on the ability of House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) to prevent the recognition of duly-elected Democratic representatives on January 3. Johnson has the power, Luttig says, to remove the current House clerk, Kevin McCumber, and replace him temporarily with a MAGA loyalist who will refuse to list Democrats on the roll of those elected to the 120th Congress.

We know what Trump did on January 6, 2021. Only Mike Pence’s courage stopped it. Now, they’ve planned more carefully, and they have Mike Johnson doing Trump’s bidding. I don’t understand it and I know we’re all doing what we can to ensure our vote counts, and yet, it almost didn’t in 2021, and now, and with it all, we hold onto and believe in the power of love.

Mary Oliver: My work is loving the world.

Posted on September 10, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Moving With and Through Sorrow

I’ve been struggling with the world seemingly turning upside down. I’m not so naive as to believe politicians haven’t always skewed the truth, but there was at least an appearance of honesty, decency, and morality. I find it challenging to listen to Trump and cronies blatantly lie and skewer the truth day after day. I know the media is more and more controlled by the super-wealthy, and yet, I still struggle.

Today I had a cranial-sacral session where I felt an ocean of sorrow behind the knee in my right leg. I had a second biopsy yesterday for squamous cell cancer on my right shin, and I was feeling a little discouraged, and there it was, sadness sloshing around.

I know that 71% of the earth’s surface is covered by water. On average, an adult human body is made up of approximately 60% water. That’s a lot of water to bounce, balance, and bring to stillness.

Feeling sorrow so deeply, I felt how I can support myself by turning into the rhythm of the earth, my home. I can balance with the pull of the moon, the push and pull of the earth’s tides, high and low, changing through the 28 day cycle. I can center in my gut rather than hovering and tottering on the edge of fear.

Muhammad Ali’s words come to mind: “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, the hands can’t hit what the eyes can’t see.”

Currently, we’re even more fully awake to the lies; blindfolds are off, and knowing enough, we float like butterflies, and sting like bees. We balance on flexibility and respond as we hone and polish our fight.

This is how we’ll rest, renew, and celebrate on November 3rd, 2026. I’ll add champagne.

Posted on September 3, 2026September 3, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Passage

Busy with our grandson, I’ve been happily neglectful of the news but today I’m with the passing of Wendell Berry and Gloria Steinem, two powerful greats of my lifetime.

I sit with Wendell Berry’s poem “The Real Work”, with what can motivate us now to continue the work of these two wonders.

The Real Work

Wendell Berry

It may be that when we no longer know what to do

we have come to our real work,

and that when we no longer know which way to go

we have come to our real journey.

The mind that is not baffled is not employed.

The impeded stream is the one that sings

Guidance for teaching our children, our future.

Honoring the beauty, intricacy and inter-connectivity that nourishes and enriches our lives.

Posted on August 28, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Connecting Response

I rose early this morning. It was warm, for here, and still, as I watered by hand outside. Then, the wind came up, shaking the trees with a shift, and the fog came pouring over the ridge.

I’ve been with the disaster in Nepal and Tibet as we see more examples of climate change, change that isn’t bound by the boundaries of countries. Many who died were on a spiritual pilgrimage. They were circling Mount Kailash, a 33 mile trek.

Again today I’m with the words of Fritz Perls: We don’t have an organism. We are the organism.

And this organism extends beyond what we perceive as “ourselves”. We are all affected by what happens on this planet and around it.

I read about the immediate response to the fire near me. Responding resources included two fire crews, four Type 3 wildland fire engines, two water tenders, three helicopters, including MCFD & PG&E Helicopter 6PG, one air attack and two air tankers. Totaling about 70 first responders.

I watched the helicopters going back and forth long after the fire was officially out. The response was quick here, and yet, this country is currently led by an administration wearing blinders, going backwards when it comes to climate change. Each day we’re reminded, whether we live where we’re dealing with unprecedented flooding, tides, winds, or breathing in smoke from another country, another state, or nearby. Climate change is real. How do we come together as a planet in response?

Posted on August 26, 2026August 26, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Dolly Parton

I read the tributes to this outstanding human being. I didn’t know that when the pandemic struck in 2020, Dolly donated $1 million to Vanderbilt University Medical Center to fund research on developing the Moderna’s vaccine. She then got her Moderna shot on camera and performed a new version of her hit “Jolene.”

“Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, I’m begging you – please don’t hesitate. Because once you’re dead, then that’s a bit too late.”

Then she rolled up her sleeve and offered one final piece of medical advice:

“Don’t be such a chicken squat. Get out there and get your shot.”

Go to youtube and watch her sing and get her shot. We’ve been looking for someone to shift the tide on this horror show. I’m sorry for her passing, and yet, I thank her for giving us the shot of inspiration we need. She’s giving us our shot of hope and trust in love and care for all!

Thank you, Dolly!

Dolly: If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.

Posted on August 24, 2026August 24, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

The Hero’s Narrative

I’m struggling with the political atrocities these days. There are so many things one might discuss but I’m going with the essay The Barbie Backlash by Susan Faludi, where she compares Christopher Nolan’s movie “The Odyssey” with Greta Gerwig’s movie “Barbie” both representing the hero’s narrative. She then goes on to discuss how women are treated today.

She writes: Mr. Trump’s return to power resembled a sack of Troy — with women getting the sack.

She goes on and comes to this on the treatment of women in the military in his administration:

Who are these veteran female officers relieved of their commands by the “central casting” (Trump’s words) matinee idol with the gelled hair and pocket hankie, the face that launched a thousand missiles?

Well, for starters, just in the Navy —

Admiral Franchetti: rose from surface warfare officer to command the Sixth Fleet; first woman to lead the Navy and the first permanent female member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; 40 years of service. Fired from her post, no explanation. Replaced by a man.

Vice Adm. Shoshana Chatfield: commanded the Helicopter Sea Combat units; first female president of the Naval War College and the only woman on NATO’s Military Committee; 37 years of service. Fired from her post, no explanation. Replaced (in an acting capacity) by a man.

Vice Adm. Yvette M. Davids: veteran of Desert Shield, Desert Storm and the Iraq war; commanded a carrier strike group; first woman and first Hispanic officer to head the U.S. Naval Academy; 36 years of service. Relieved of her post, no explanation. Replaced by a man.

Adm. Linda Fagan, Coast Guard; Vice Adm. Nancy Lacore, Navy; Col. Julie Sposito-Salceies, Air Force; Lt. Gen. Telita Crosland, Army; and on and on. These women didn’t claim heroic status; they embodied what the military has traditionally valued: service, teamwork, courage, dedication. But in terms of their mythic warrior life journeys, they are among our Odysseuses. And their elevation has enraged some Odyssean wannabes eager to enshrine what Mr. Hegseth calls “the highest male standard.”

In his book “The War on Warriors,” Mr. Hegseth maintained that so-called D.E.I. hires have made the military weak and “effeminate.” The “standard,” though, has nothing to do with military effectiveness. Were Admirals Franchetti and Chatfield, General Crosland and company fired for not being good enough? Or for being too good, with skills and experience that threatened the restoration of a masculinist culture? Small wonder the photos of Mr. Trump’s cabinet meetings — especially after the departures of Pam Bondi, Kristi Noem, Lori Chavez-DeRemer and Tulsi Gabbard — have begun to resemble the shipboard scenes in “The Odyssey”: men seated around the edge of a long wooden ellipse, with a board table standing in for a galley deck. Pull, boys, pull!

Mr. Trump’s return to power resembled a sack of Troy — with women getting the sack.

We were at the beach yesterday with my son and grandson building in the sand. The high tide will wash their creations away. May the same happen to all that Trump and his cronies have touched.

Building a sand castle that even protected by a moat, the incoming tide will wash away!

Posted on August 20, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

How We Meet What Comes

I’m struggling with the political news these days. The bombardment of corruption and lies stuns. How then do we revive, bring in the tide?

I find support in Rebecca Elson’s poem from her book, A Responsibility to Awe. She was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma at the age of 29. She continued her writing and scientific work until she died of the disease at the age of 39. I offer the first two stanzas, and then can’t stop and give the whole poem.

ANTIDOTES TO FEAR OF DEATH
by Rebecca Elson

Sometimes as an antidote
To fear of death,
I eat the stars.

Those nights, lying on my back,
I suck them from the quenching dark
Til they are all, all inside me,
Pepper hot and sharp.

No outer space, just space,
The light of all the not yet stars
Drifting like a bright mist,
And all of us, and everything
Already there
But unconstrained by form.

And sometime it’s enough
To lie down here on earth
Beside our long ancestral bones:

To walk across the cobble fields
Of our discarded skulls,
Each like a treasure, like a chrysalis,
Thinking: whatever left these husks
Flew off on bright wings.

Posted on August 17, 2026August 17, 2026 by Cathy Edgett

Strength

Here’s the winning poem in Tricycle Magazine’s Best of Season haiku for Fall 2026.

this world we live in

ten thousand scarecrows on guard

and only one bird

You can find your own interpretation but I consider that we are the one bird that can defeat those who try to scare us with what is false. As birds we fly up, and seeing the whole field, we feast on the truth.