Non-Player Characters

And the World we are Making

Things are moving along with the transition to the south. We sold our house and closed this week and next we close on the house we purchased in Lyman, South Carolina, a small town between Spartanburg and Greenville. The house we purchased is bigger than our Ohio house and it needs some TLC. But it has so many of the things we were looking for in a home. It has plenty of outdoor space for us to nurture and develop, it has ample storage, complete with additional detached garage with 3 bays and room for a wood working shop for Kurt. The kitchen is larger than what I am used to but a little quirky with the oven in the adjoining family room in the fireplace wall. I have tried to figure out how to explain this and well, you might need to see it to understand. It is weird for sure. There will literally be years’ worth of projects with this house, but it has solid bones and will be fun to bring back to its 1960’s glory. Our Mid-Century furniture will be right at home in this house. I am excited to get in there and get started.

The last blog I wrote about how life is wonderful and horrible at the same time and in this moment of history that could not be truer. I have gotten to babysit for Lylah several times while her parents did a variety of things. That has been such a blessing. That I could be here, that I could ease things for Emmy and Rhodes, that I could participate so fully in the life of my granddaughter. Nothing could be better. All while the country continues to be destroyed by a regime that values nothing but wealth and power for a few. I heard Heather Cox Richardson say that in the gaming world there are what are called non-player characters. She stated that all of us, the bottom 99% are of no consequence. We have no role to play, we have no control, we are expendable. That has haunted me ever since I heard it.

This makes such sense though doesn’t it. Our president said this week that as a nation all of our money should go to making our military the best in the world. That the government has no money for Medicare, Medicaid, daycare, housing, medical care, education or any other program that benefit non-player characters like us. No money for hospitals, roads, oversight that keeps us safe like the EPA or FDA. No money for the agencies that track severe weather like NOAH and NWS. And certainly, no money for helping communities and non-player characters rebuild with help from a fully funded FEMA. Like our neighbors, like those so long marginalized by society, we aren’t real., we don’t count. And when this administration does talk about non-player characters, they put the blame fully on us. Like telling parents at Christmas time to only get one doll for their daughters (interesting that girls were singled out), or the secretary of agriculture saying we need to eat one small piece of chicken, one piece of broccoli, a tortilla, and one other item.

It has always been part of the Right’s playbook. Victim blaming. If a woman gets pregnant, she is to blame. If a woman is raped, she is to blame. You remember the verse in the Bible that says, and I am paraphrasing here, “If your eye causes you to lust, pluck out the girl in the short skirt.” It is not the corporations that are finding ways to not pays millions in taxes, it is the single mother who is getting a few hundred dollars a month in SNAP to feed her family that is part of the “waste and abuse.” Blaming the non-player characters, while the players with the all the control have complete immunity.

All of this is enough to make my blood boil. It is enough to think about the ways that it impacts me and my generation but when I think about the world we are leaving to Lylah and her generation it is hard to not be completely overwhelmed and incapacitated. And that is exactly where they want us. So aware of our limited power that we give in and allow them to win. But we are coming together. We are strong and we are uniting. And that is what gives me hope for my granddaughter future. A dear friend of mine, struggling through chemo made a sign and went to the latest No Kings Protest in her town. She told me that she was going because when her grandchildren are adults, she wants them to know that she fought for their constitutional rights and for a better world for them.

What keeps me going when I look into those little eyes and hold those sweet little hands is knowing that when this is over, and it will be over, I stood on the side of those with the least amount of power and most to lose. I was on the right side of history. So be of good courage my fellow non-players characters, there are more of us than there are of them.

Find something beautiful this week and keep up the fight.