Back when I was a self-loathing pick-me Republican, I did get one thing right, Democratic leadership can be just as arrogant and self assured in all the wrong ways that Republicans can. Yes, back then I thought EVERYONE was arrogant (still do). Mind you, I have been a Democrat now for 11 years and the more I hope to see my now party change, I worry they won’t.

I worry they will keep insulting voters by calling them “lower educated,” “low information voters,” and “cult members”. Yes, some of the MAGA folks are but not all Republicans. And, then talk about how we accept everyone for who they are and value diversity, and THEY don’t. Then I watch the Democrats turn on each other while at the same time rejoicing over Republicans doing the same.

Point being, the beliefs are very different but the style and meanness look almost exactly alike.

I worry the Boomer elites will still live in idealism and not reality; that the younger generations will live in idealism and not reality of different flavors.

I worry Democrats think that they don’t have a version of the Republican “Good ‘Ol Boys” network without realizing their penchant for giving older leadership their “turn” to lead is basically the same thing with slightly less misogyny. I worry Democrats will look at successful local or state campaigns and turn them into formulaic talking points and action plans instead of actually meeting their constituents where they are at with an eye toward the greater good.

Not every community or electoral race should pattern themselves after New York City (even though I love NYC!).

I worry that we will not ever understand that the opposite of love is not hate, it’s apathy.

And while I love all the talk of a huge “blue wave” in November, we can’t take anything for granted. We have to be mindful, purposeful, not reactive.

The country is in a lot of pain. We need leaders to actually do the hard work of leading.

Welcome to Mugwump Ramblings, where once week I’m untangling decades of religious/political trauma, the next I’m laughing at myself, and somehow it all ends with coffee.

If you’ve ever felt like a ping-pong ball in a dryer, you’ll fit right in.

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Couldn’t even wait two weeks after July 4th, our 250th birthday and we gotta get all twisted in a knot about someone dying? Of course! America loves a spectacle — even in death. The moment Lindsey Graham’s passing hit the news, the internet lit up like a stadium: half mourning, half mocking, everyone convinced their reaction was righteous. And honestly? I get it. The man spent decades weaponizing policy against people like me. He earned the contempt. But still — I couldn’t join the victory lap whole heartedly (even though some of the memes made me chuckle).

I couldn’t stand him. I detested his politics. I found his moral flexibility nauseating. He was the kind of man who could look straight into a camera, lie through his teeth, and still get invited back to Sunday morning shows. So when he died, I understood the catharsis. I understood the memes. I even understood the laughter. But I couldn’t participate.

Not because I’m noble. Not because I’m forgiving. Because celebrating the death of a sitting US Senator feels like bad patriotism — the kind that confuses vengeance for virtue.

Yeah, I know. I’m the old guy, standing on my lawn the neighbor kids CAN play on holding my sparkler, waving my flag, sipping some spiked lemonade while reciting the bill of rights...

I can’t rejoice in the death of the wicked without feeling like I’ve betrayed the version of America I still, somehow, believe in. The one that’s supposed to be better than its worst instincts. The one that’s supposed to hold space for accountability without losing its humanity.

And that belief — fragile, bruised, stubborn — is the only kind of patriotism I have left.

Let’s be clear: I’m not defending him. I’m not rewriting history. Lindsey Graham’s legacy is a masterclass in hypocrisy. He spent years enabling cruelty, then tried to rebrand it as “principle.” He helped build a political machine that chews up truth and spits out grievance. He made life harder for people who were already fighting to exist.

So no, I don’t mourn him. But I also don’t dance on his grave. Because the minute I start celebrating death, I start mirroring the same moral rot I’ve spent years calling out.

That’s the hangover — the one that hits after the fireworks fade and the hashtags die down. The realization that patriotism isn’t necessarily about loving the flag; it’s about refusing to become the monster you fought.

And listen, I’m not judging anyone who did celebrate. Some folks have every right to feel relief. Some have scars that never healed. Their reactions are theirs. Their patriotism, whatever that looks like, is theirs. I don’t get to police that.

But mine? Mine’s wired differently. It’s stitched together from too many nights spent believing this country could still grow up. It’s the kind that whispers, “Don’t lose yourself just because everyone else is doing their thing.”

Now, will I maintain this moral clarity when Trump eventually goes?

Let’s not kid ourselves. My patriotism might need a sabbatical that day. F**k Resident Clump. But even then, I suspect I’ll land in the same place — relieved, not gleeful… well … not totally gleeful ;). Because I don’t want to become the thing I escaped.

Patriotism, for me, is restraint in a culture that rewards rage.

It’s refusing to trade integrity for applause.

It’s believing that America can still be redeemed — even when its loudest voices make that belief feel naïve.

Welcome to Mugwump Ramblings, where once a week I’m untangling decades of religious trauma, the next I’m laughing at myself, and somehow it all ends with coffee.

If you’ve ever felt like a ping-pong ball in a dryer, you’ll fit right in.

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I’ve lived in enough places to know that every state has its own personality. Some are reserved. Some are polished. Some are convinced they’re more important than everyone else.

Florida, on the other hand, is the eccentric uncle who shows up to Thanksgiving wearing flip-flops, carrying a pet iguana, and insisting he has a foolproof plan to grill the turkey during a tropical storm.

You laugh at him.

Then, somehow, the turkey turns out amazing.

I wasn’t born here, which may explain why I still notice things that lifelong Floridians hardly acknowledge anymore. The first time I saw an alligator sunning itself beside a retention pond in a suburban neighborhood, I thought someone should call Animal Control. The people walking past me barely looked up from their phones.

“Oh, that’s Gary,” they seemed to be saying. “He keeps to himself.”

The wildlife here has absolutely no respect for personal boundaries. Lizards sprint across sidewalks like they own the deed to your property. Sandhill cranes stop traffic because they know they can. Ibis patrol Publix parking lots with the confidence of organized crime bosses collecting protection money in the form of dropped French fries. Even the squirrels seem unusually confident, as if they’ve figured out humans are mostly bluffing.

Then there’s the weather.

I’ve lived in places where meteorologists carefully explain approaching storms over the course of several days. Florida’s forecast is more spontaneous.

At three o’clock the sky is brilliant blue. By three-fifteen it looks like the opening scene of an apocalypse movie. Rain falls so hard you begin wondering whether someone tipped the Gulf of Mexico sideways. Lightning cracks with theatrical enthusiasm, palm trees bend dramatically, and every outdoor plan you’ve made dissolves into a puddle.

By four o’clock the sun is shining again, someone is mowing the lawn, and your neighbor is grilling burgers as if none of it ever happened.

If Florida has taught me anything, it’s that life can completely fall apart for twenty minutes and then unexpectedly become beautiful again.

That’s not just true about the weather.

It’s true about people.

When I first moved here, I wasn’t looking for Florida. I was looking for whatever came next.

Like many of us, I’ve lived several different lives. I’ve been certain about things that later unraveled. I’ve built careers that eventually ended. I’ve held convictions that no longer fit the person I was becoming. Somewhere along the way, I stopped thinking life was a straight line and accepted that it’s more like wandering through an unfamiliar city without a map.

Florida turned out to be an appropriate place for that kind of wandering.

It’s difficult to take yourself too seriously in a state where hurricanes are given friendly first names and everyone debates whether bottled water or peanut butter is the more essential emergency supply. Floridians prepare for natural disasters with a curious mixture of common sense and optimism.

“We should probably keep an eye on this storm.”

“Absolutely.”

“You think it’ll hit us?”

“Hard to say.”

“Want to go to Publix?”

Of course we do.

Publix deserves its own chapter in Florida history. Somewhere between the bakery, the deli, and the impossibly cheerful employees asking if they can help you find something, it became more than a grocery store. It’s practically a community center with better sandwiches. I don’t know what they put in those chicken tender subs, but I’m fairly certain they’re responsible for maintaining statewide morale during hurricane season.

And speaking of hurricanes, there’s something oddly comforting about the way Floridians face them together. Neighbors check on neighbors. People share generators, chainsaws, and bags of ice. Complete strangers help one another clear fallen trees. For all the jokes about “Florida Man,” I’ve encountered far more Florida kindness than Florida craziness.

Maybe that’s true everywhere. The headlines just aren’t interested in ordinary goodness.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized that the places we love aren’t necessarily the most beautiful or the most exciting. They’re the places where our lives quietly unfold. Home isn’t built from postcards or travel brochures. It’s built from favorite restaurants, familiar roads, neighbors who wave, sunsets you’ve watched a hundred times, and ordinary Tuesdays that slowly become the story of your life.

Florida is where I continued writing after I wasn’t sure I had a book in me.

It’s where I met the man who became my husband.

It’s where I’ve laughed with friends, buried old versions of myself, started therapy again when I needed it, and slowly discovered that healing isn’t usually dramatic. Most of the time, it looks like living another ordinary day with a little more honesty than the day before.

Looking back, I realize I didn’t simply move to Florida.

I grew into it.

Its unpredictability made me a little more flexible. Its storms reminded me that bad weather doesn’t last forever. Its beauty taught me to pay attention, because some of the most breathtaking sunsets I’ve ever seen arrived only after skies that looked impossible an hour earlier.

Maybe that’s why I feel at home here.

Florida isn’t polished. Neither am I.

It’s a little loud, occasionally misunderstood, stubbornly resilient, surprisingly generous, and just eccentric enough to keep life interesting.

Come to think of it, we’re probably good for each other.

So go ahead and make the “Florida Man” jokes. I’ll probably laugh right along with you.

Just don’t expect me to live anywhere else.

After all, every family has that one delightfully eccentric relative who embarrasses everyone at reunions but would also drive across the state at two in the morning if you needed help.

America’s just lucky Florida is ours.

And I’m lucky it’s mine.

I almost didn’t go.

It was my first Pride after coming out, and I spent far too much time trying to think of reasons to stay home.

What if someone recognized me?

What if I didn’t belong?

What if everyone else looked like they knew exactly who they were while I wandered around looking like a tourist who had taken a wrong turn?

For years, I had lived inside a world where Pride wasn’t something to celebrate. It was something to warn people about. Something to debate. Something to fear.

And now I was driving toward it.

Terrified.

I wish I could tell you I arrived full of confidence and immediately felt at home. I didn’t. I felt like an imposter. Like someone who had accidentally wandered backstage before the show started.

The funny thing about fear is that it rarely tells the whole story. Because somewhere in the middle of that overwhelming, noisy, colorful day, a man asked if I’d like to get coffee sometime. That man is now my husband.

Life has a wicked sense of humor.

The place I had once been taught represented everything wrong with the world became the place where my future quietly introduced itself. Not with fireworks. Not with a choir of angels. Just with coffee.

…

Looking back, I realize my fear that day wasn’t really about Pride. It was about identity. For years, I had believed the greatest act of faith was protesting the very person I was. I didn’t stand outside Pride with a picket sign. I carried something much heavier.

I carried the belief that if I prayed long enough, surrendered hard enough, and obeyed faithfully enough, God might someday make me someone else. I wasn’t protesting gay people. I was protesting Randy.

…

These days, when June rolls around, I think about that frightened man walking into his first Pride carrying more fear than confidence. If I could find him in that crowd, I’d probably put a hand on his shoulder and tell him to breathe. I’d tell him that healing isn’t nearly as loud as fear makes it sound. I’d tell him that one day he’ll stop negotiating with God over whether he’s allowed to exist.

And then I’d smile and point across the crowd. “See that guy over there?” “Go have coffee when he asks you to.” You never know how God is going to answer a prayer.

Sometimes the answer isn’t becoming someone else.

Sometimes it’s finally becoming yourself.

Welcome to Mugwump Ramblings, where one week I’m untangling decades of religious trauma, the next I’m laughing at myself, and somehow it all ends with coffee.

If you’ve ever felt like a ping-pong ball in a dryer, you’ll fit right in.

Come subscribe (free or paid, right now all content is free). We have stories, questionable life choices, and occasional moments of unexpected grace.

Subscribe now