The Field is across the street from a convenience store and a man who works at that store is a Trump supporter. He drives a huge truck with window decals that say such thoughtful things like “Re-elect Trump! Make Liberals Cry Again!” and “Keep America Great” as though anyone would actually describe this as great.
Another sign on his truck says “Fuck Your Feelings.” It is this particular sentiment I would like to discuss for today. I would like to take issue with the plural on the “feelings” because there is only one feeling these people are talking about and that one is Empathy1.
Other than Empathy, I am going to posit that Trump supporters have cornered the market on expressing feelings. Granted, their emotional spectrum seems to run from “super angry” to “We’re a pretend militia!” with the only deviation being their regular trips to Outrage, Conspiracyville.
They take up so much room, these people and their feelings. And their hats. And their buttons. And their flags. It’s like they’re compensating for something; I assume that something is substance. My mother always said the first person to yell in an argument loses.
This morning, as I traveled to work in my Humvee (Kia Soul) instead of my two-wheel tank, I experienced one of these sensitive feelers and my oh my did he automatically lose the argument.
I turned left at a light onto a busy four-lane street. Per driving laws, I turned left into the left lane and this car screeched out from behind me and flew past me in the right lane. This is fine. Sometimes people have diarrhea and really need to get home. I was listening to music and my bowels were good so it didn’t faze me.
However, the car pulled just far enough ahead of me to allow the driver of the car to ……… hang out of the driver side window and begin screaming at me. While driving. This wasn’t “Maybe he’s telling me I have a taillight out” yelling. There were gestures and the man was most definitely full of feelings while screeching at me to go fuck myself.
Now, I’m an American woman (probably exactly the kind Lenny Kravitz was singing about). With this designation, I was first and foremost obligated to review my behavior prior to this moment to find what minor traffic violation I did to cause such road rage. An American man’s anger should always be examined critically to find a woman to blame.
This instinctual review was easy, though, because there had been absolutely no strange driving moments up to this point.
And then it struck me and I began laughing. Just straight up genuine laughter, not a reaction based on discomfort. I even waved at him, giving him my very best dainty “Toodaloo” finger movement while ensuring that he (a) saw my laughter and (b) didn’t drive into my lane OR get behind me again.
(B) was very important, see. I needed to protect Mr. Trump Supporter from the terrible awful thing I subjected him to that seemed to trigger him so immensely that this was his chosen response. We must protect the most vulnerable among us from trauma and disturbing images.
If there are “quiet” or “subtle” Trump supporters, I have yet to meet one. It must be so hard to be so emotional. My heart goes out to him.
Just kidding. That guy can go fuck off right quick for me having to spend any time paying attention to him. I was listening to a good song, god dammit, and everyone who knows me knows that I HATE WHEN I GET INTERRUPTED WHILE LISTENING TO A GOOD SONG.
Making conservatives cry is apparently not very hard. I recommend it – 4 out of 5 stars.
1 Empathy is capitalized here because it is a proper feeling that deserves to be a proper noun.
