Year In Review

Although 2018 is a year I will happily put in the rear-view mirror, it started well enough for me when I published my settlement with my former agency, which I retired from involuntarily in 2016 because of pervasive age discrimination in my division, in which the agency (i) paid me $5,000 in settlement; (ii) changed my last performance rating from Acceptable to Outstanding which is what it should have been all along were it not for the ageism perpetrated against me by some of the management; and (iii) required training for the managers of my former division, focused on combatting age discrimination.  The settlement importantly did not have an NDA clause, and so I settled it for much less money than were my actual damages, and the resistance lives on.

Things nationally and internationally went to hades as the year wore on, from bloody school shootings to phony summits between two two-bit strongmen and an American phony, and I participated in rallies in the District during the first half of the year against the rapid deterioration of American greatness, including at the Supreme Court against voter suppression, the schoolchildren's March for Our Lives, and the protest at the White House against Zero Tolerance at the southern border.  These anti-democratic trends are shocking departures from traditional American values and thankfully the midterms showed that America is on the road back to its former greatness after two nightmarish years.  Still, there's a lot of work to be done by thinking, patriotic Americans to combat America's lurch towards isolationism and nationalism by people who don't know a thing about the history of the 1930s.

My year and my life changed mid-summer when I started suffered a torn retina which necessitated three surgeries so far, two on an emergency, same-day basis.  Although my activities are severely limited while I heal, I was able to attend a cousin's funeral but missed a nephew's wedding, and I was able to undertake half of my annual rocky scramble along the rugged Billy goat Trail but missed out on my yearly autumnal drive along the Shenandoah Ridge.

Most notably were the midterm congressional elections, in which I worked for the successful congessional campaign of Democrat Jennifer Wexton against GOP incumbent Barbara Trumpstock in the Tenth Virginia District, helping to flip the seat as part of the blue wave washing over America in November.  My adventures canvassing were exhilarating, from having a man threaten to shoot me to having several loyal democrats and many renounced republicans literally seething as they assured me that they had a plan for election day--to vote a straight democratic ticket.  Most importantly I had my third and hopefully last eye surgery in mid-December, so by March or April I can finally get back to regular activities.