Sometimes, it is challenging to maintain focus, even when you’re all grown up and don’t have ADHD. Maybe it’s just ADD, because hyperactivity requires too much energy.
Last week, I was all prepared to write about those nude Donald Trump statues that popped up in various American cities. Of course, someone had to point out that the humor in this art/political ridicule had its foundation in body shaming. So, I got “laugh-shamed” by those who are more politically correct, which includes just about everybody in America who isn’t voting for Donald Trump in the first place. So I lost my focus on Nekkid Donald and moved to another topic, one based on something else that was swirling around.
This week, I thought I’d write about Dressed-Up Donald and his little trip to Old Mexico (does anyone else remember when it was called that?) followed by his big speech on immigration policy. But, then he said he didn’t ask the Mexican president to pay for his wall, which I thought was the point of the trip. After all, even when you build a fence, you let the neighbors know in advance what you’re planning to do. Particularly if what you’re planning to do is send them the bill. Donald said he didn’t talk about Mexico paying for the wall, and El Presidente said he had made it clear from the get-go that Mexico wasn’t paying for it. So did Donald wuss out or did he lie? You tell me.
Settling in this evening to watch the immigration speech, that focus problem kicked in again. After the first 15 minutes of Trump saying (emphatically) everything that his acolytes wanted to hear, the television image of Trump started morphing into a vision of him working at Sea World with a big plastic bucket throwing large chucks of red meat to dolphins erect in the water and carrying signs that said “Make America Wet Again.” Snap, and focus on the speech.
By 30 minutes in, the speech (and its volume) had moved into rant territory. Focus gone again, some stream of consciousness thinking started up about how long would a woman be allowed to be that bombastic before she’d be carted off to a hospital somewhere. Trump started morphing into Hillary, and I had a vision of Bill Clinton or Robby Mook or even that sweet Tim Kaine pulling Hillary off the stage, with her screaming, “I’m not DONE YET!” Oh, yeah, you would be, honey. Snap, and back to the speech.
An hour after the speech began, I knew I wasn’t going to write about what Trump was saying. I thought about going back to the Nekkid Donald story I hadn’t done last week. Focus gone, I started to wonder how far off the mark that statue might be. And, Lord, I knew I could not let Donald start morphing into that—not this close to bedtime. Focus on something else. Something nice.
So it is funny how things turned out. I ended up with a column about Donald after all. And I did think about something nice before bedtime. And I have an idea for another column based that. Something about politicians who should pose for a nude statue. Without naming names, I can think of three off the top of my head that would be worthy subjects and who are already semi-nude on the internet. And, it would be an easy column to write, because half of you wouldn’t read the column anyway—just skim for the names, and go from googling to goggling pretty quickly. And then your own ADD could kick in. With or without the H.
