Once upon a time I frequently used the analogy that little monsters that get tucked away into a closet only get bigger and meaner the next time they’re able to break free and spill out across the floor.

Of course I was talking about personal emotional baggage and the importance of facing things and dealing with them…but it makes me wonder if this analogy works in the macroscopic view too… I speak of the horrible things that seem to happen more often within our country. And if the answer would be yes, like one might assume, what would be the fix? Is there one? A feasible one?

I would consider that in the personal cosmos among the thousand-some ‘me’s’ that each person holds within themselves…for what are we than walking contradictions… AND if one would be able to get passed the self-destructive ‘me’s’ to the me’s which hold a pervasive sense of self-interest, one might choose to find a solution. Granted, it might not always be correct at first but a course that is started can be amended and tweaked.

We name our personal monsters as we battle ourselves and come up with our action plan or we shove the beasties once again into the closet and hope they go away…(they don’t) but we choose. We choose.

But this macroscope…with millions of other people with whom we have no control over…and a growing divisiveness of what it means to even be counted as human …let alone the plethora of issues….what do we do? Honestly, what can one person do?

How do we deal with these growing closet monsters? How do we find the common ground to give/admit these monsters’ names and reduce their growth? How do we keep them from splintering us further as they grow.

Unbelievably, as I stare out into the vast chaos of the unknowable I keep hearing the phrase:

“Even the smallest person can change the course of the future.” (J.R.R. Tolkien)

Which of course could tip this little essay into a sketch of “the monster… um… ‘Sauron’ can be defeated by all of us singing Kumbaya at the top of our lungs while every 11th person played taps on their left big toenail and all the little children dance AND at the same time the big bad ring will be tossed into the volcano.” But the foundation of this inane gibberwash IS these little monsters beg to be named. They beg to be identified, to be admitted, because ONLY then can we create a do-able action plan.

But what are their names? Is it safe to speak their true names? Is it safe not to?

We’ve our not-so-little monsters trolling our towns and cities laughing and multiplying because we give them conflicting upside-down and sideways names and feed them our disgust and our surrender.

We point fingers at each other and gnash our teeth and tuck ourselves away behind doorways where monsters used to hide.

…and I think they’re too big to shove back in the closet.