Tripping Over A Loose Neuron On the Way to the Pandemic

In times like this, one has entirely too much time on their hands. And when hands are idle, well, forgetting about the devil, I can get into plenty of trouble on my own.

So, I often spend lots of time wandering around in the logic, feelings, data, intuitive leanings and flotsom of my brain. A nice normal brain I think, not a brain hemmed in with superlatives or self-congratulatory adjectives.

Oh, I see, this is leaving you bored already huh?

Well, if you got better things to do, I'll understand. I blogged for ten years and mostly people suggested to me that they indeed had better things to do. And that was a time when there were ACTUAL better things to do.

Okay, I'll begin with the burning question that I must get out.

But first, let me set the background. This goes back to my childhood and attending public school with a variety of people, some friends and some not friends, mostly . I went to an institution known as Hamady High School located on the outskirts of the factory town known as Flint Michigan. It was not a large school (my graduating class was 103 if I recall).

A good many of my graduating class consisted of people I had gone to kindergarden with, the rest mostly I had met by junior high when the three feeder elementary schools all led to the one junior high. In other words, many of us grew up together and knew each other well.

Our school, like many others was extremely cliquish. There was the perverbial "in" group consisting of those persons who did the sports, cheered the sports, and "ran" the school government. They were on all the committees for float construction, pep rallies, prom planning. They were also the candidates for all the "pretty" things like queen and kings of various extravaganzas.

There was the "other" group consisting of my friends and acquaintances, and we befriended others who were "cool" and all that stuff. We wore leather jackets a lot, smoked cigarettes and drank a beer now and then. We "ran" with boys from so-called rough schools. Our group was not a group but smaller neucleic groups who interchanged people as events might dictate.

The next group was also unnamed but clear. Almost all of us were working class kids but some seemed to be worse off. They were the poorer among us and looked it. They kept to themselves mostly, or we made it clear that we wanted nothing to do with them.

Last were the group of catch-all folks. These were the nerds of the day, the "serious students" , the religious types. They were all nice but frankly they often didn't enjoy or had stricter parents and didn't participate.

We all stuck to our group. We might interact in class rooms as needed but there was no doubt when in the hallways or bathrooms, you kept to your own kind.

I started out in the "in" group but was pushed out inch by inch and I finally realized that I was not wanted by at least 8th grade or so, and by 9th grade I was finding friendship in the "cool" group.

Now fast track to the present.

We have to one degree or another reestablished some contact through Facebook. I decided when I got friend requests from people from the "in" group, that I would lay aside past grievances, and see where 30-40 years had taken these people and the people I called friends in high school. I decided to give everyone a clean slate to work from and let "bygones be bygones".

Before too long I realized that many of the "in" crowd had become fundamentalists and politically conservative if that is today a fair term given the wacked out theories some of them spout. True conservatives now blanch at being connected to these folks. I was quickled "unfriended" by a good many of them. (while they would probably recognize themselves here, none will read it, so no worries).

That simmered for years and I left Facebook, suffering from burnout over the 2016 election. I went to rallies, marched, carried signs, made dozens of phone calls to elected officials. And then I truly gave up and turned inward. I worked on my spiritual life, I quilted (2) knit (2) crocheted (2), mosaiced (2) and beaded up things (6). I macramed bracelets and necklaces.

And then the virus hit and I felt I should return to the news in some form. And eventually I wanted to touch base with people on Facebook, mostly to assure myself that folks were okay.

And after weeks of Facebook and seeing the same people still fighting so vigorously over the same issues--all people I admire to be sure--it struck me.

The payOFF is coming folks!

I realized that the people who I had connected with on Facebook after all these years who were my original "group" were essentially all liberals, all left of center by a mile in their thinking about race and religion, about equality and fairness, about the need to redistribute wealth in this country and return to a strong middle class.

I realized that all the people I had reconnected to in the in group, were not these things. I was regularly pointed to read this and read that--regularly cited to World Net Daily, Breitbart, and other notorious rags with little truth content. It was even explained to me by one lady whom I knew quite well, that there was not a racist bone in her body which was proveable by the fact that she took in a pregnant Black girl and helped her until she gave birth and as she said, "my goodness she was darker than Obama!" as if shade of unwhiteness was proof of her open-mindedness.

Oh by the way, all the nerds? They turned out to be all over the place, but MOST were and are damn fine individuals who think deeply and logically.

Now, it's important to know that as far as I can see, this has little to do with education or profession or lack of either. The spread of jobs and careers is large. Some stayed in Flint or nearby all their lives. Others have traveled and lived many places in the country. Married and divorced, remarried or not, there is no common thread I can find.

My question is this: In our youth, when we are still mightily uninformed and have so much yet to learn about the world and our place  in it, is there something subconscious  that reognizes "kindred" spirits, people who will one day think essentially along the same lines as we do? Who will judge the world and it's people by the same standards and definitions of decency, fairness, equality and so forth as we come to?

Make no mistake, I was raised to believe white people were superior. I recall incidents of my youth where I stated that, mimicing my father and other adults around me. By 11th grade or so, I was going to the occasional party with friends where there were Black kids and Hispanic kids and I thought it was way cool. I started to read more about race  especially in college where I had *gasp* Black friends, black boyfriends.  By the time I was in my second year of college I was ashamed of my past beliefs.

I don't recall my high school friends being any different from me. Perhaps they were but I didn't detect it.

So again, I ask, do we subconsciously see the "seeds' of the person others will become and gravitate to those like "us" whoever us is perceived to be at 13 or 16?

Did you have cliques at school? Anyone upon thinking back have similar experiences?

In the great scheme of things (gosh I just love lazy composing with phrases used by all), it's a fairly unimportant thing, but we have precious little to do these days left to our own devices as it were.

What say you?