Vicki Edison had been brought up in a quiet, reserved, respectful family - modest in practice and aspiration. They were patriotic but never xenophobic, Republican but centrist, ambitious but never greedy, religious without possession.
This was the ethos of the times, and while there were murmurs of dissent, ragged fringes to such settled, reasonable behavior, they remained out of sight; and as ethos has it, it was assumed to be permanent, the way things should be. Neighborliness, national pride, politeness, courtesy, and good nature were more than just social currency, they were absolutes. It was as if everyone drank the same elixir from the same goblet from the same shelf.
Arthur Edison was a pharmacist and compounded his own drugs. This was in the days before national chains and before pharmacies were all-purpose convenience stores, and Mr. Edison was more than just a technician. He was there to counsel, to advise, and to prescribe. In most cases bad colds cured themselves, flu ran its course, constipation, flux, and catarrh resolved themselves with diet, time, and patience, but Mr. Edison was considered a minor miracle worker.
One would never think of not tipping one's hat to passing ladies or opening doors for them. Handshakes between men were sincere, not hail-fellow-well-met routine. Children were allowed to play by themselves but never talk back. Church was a place of spiritual asylum and community association.
No one had to enforce these practices, for they were accepted by all. There was no moral police, no vigilantism, no need for a harsh word. Trash was disposed of properly, traffic rules were obeyed, and voting was a privilege.
Coming from this background of rectitude and good citizenship, it was particularly difficult for Vicki to make her way in today's world - one as far removed from the temperance and good will of her youth as she could imagine - but in many ways it suited her. As a child she was never really happy in white organdy, First Communion, piety, and discipline. There was something missing in the settledness of it all, something dampening, something unpleasant.
She made her way from a good Catholic childhood to serious student to campus unrest thanks to that restiveness - that sentiment of individual worth, identity, and the conviction that personal investment in social change mattered. By the time she was on her own, she had left the harness and traces of her past behind and embarked on a life of activism.
At each step of the way and in each distinct period of her life, there was the same sense of zeitgeist and ethos. The Sixties were no different than the Fifties, for there was the same assumption of righteousness, community, camaraderie, faith, and American ambition. There was a canon, a liturgy, a prescribed order, and received wisdom, and few denied it. One belonged to a social religion in the Sixties just as one did in the Fifties. The new generation was drinking from the same chalice, on the same altar, using the same incantations.
Vicki lived in an urban commune in the East Village, had indifferent, incidental lovers, despised the bourgeoisie, and joined Columbia students in their takeover of the university. It was a heady time, one like the Fifties, where everyone belonged to each other.
The elision to progressivism was smooth. The well-meaning, principled, but inchoate convictions of the Sixties became more codified. Social reform needed organization, structure, rules, and leadership. At the same time, this post-revolutionary period was just as generic, shared, and righteous. Once again, everyone prayed at the same communion rail.
Vicki had her ups and downs, doubts and highs, but kept the course; and before she knew it she was part of the new American political scene - an angry, contentious, and deliberately mean one. There was no room for compromise or accommodation in the Donald Trump era. The future of the black man, the environment, the lesbian, and the farm worker was at stake.
Like all periods before it, this one had its own communal solidarity all built around hatred for the President. Contrary to the past where social reformists had a positive agenda, a definitive program for progress, today's activists were negative in spirit and purpose. Of course they didn't think of themselves this way, and felt that they were beacons of hope for the future of an America with no kings, peaceful, and accommodating to all.
There was something in this feral hatred, this implacably vicious animus, and this universally condemning culture that set it apart. While the same viral effect was felt - an infection that spread widely and fast - the symptoms were disturbing. It was more hysteria than commonly-held beliefs spoken forcefully. It was voodoo drums, candomblé, war dances, human sacrifice, cannibalism, and totems. It was if the whole country - or at least the most ferocious believers - had been possessed.
Before she knew it, Vicki was one of them. She boiled with hatred for Trump, shouted j'accuse! at anyone who strayed, spat on American flags, transparent symbols of MAGA membership, gathered in basements, on the Mall, and on streetcorners to vent their anger.
Everywhere in University Park, the leafy upscale Northwest Washington neighborhood where she lived, people shook their heads, gave each other knowing smiles, talked about 'him' with no reference needed, walked with confidence knowing that everyone was in solidarity. The virus had completed its rounds, was now endemic and spreading.
However, this brain disease was taking its toll on Vicki. At times she could not hold back her tears. She could no longer speak coherently but spluttered. She felt all tight and wound up inside as though a time bomb were ticking and about to explode. The very thought of 'him' produced uncontrollable rage, and she felt like running into the street, tearing off her clothes and shouting.
She was not alone in her anxiety and febrile hatred. Her neighbors were feeling the same possession, the same uncontrollable hatred, the same frustration and indignity. The whole of University Park became Bedlam, an insane asylum without bars and screened windows.
Vicki was close to delirium as she wandered from bath to garden, in the front door and out the back, muttering, slamming her fist against the wall, beseeching God for salvation, tearing her hair, and imagining the most horrible, murderous thoughts.
Her fortitude cracked, her crucible of hope split apart, her whole world rocked and tilted and finally crashed. She emerged from a drug-induced stupor to realize that she was not home, but at St. Elizabeth's a state mental hospital in Olney. She tugged at her restraints, shouted for help, and was sedated once again.
She was one of the lucky ones, institutionalized before she harmed herself or others; but how many more like her were on the verge of madness, at the tipping point hovering between insanity and political rabidness?
The hysteria shows no sign of abating and women like Vicki are still parading the streets demanding the demission of Donald Trump. They wanted to see him in a tumbril headed for the guillotine, getting his final due, freeing the good people of America from his tyranny. Their faces twisted into maniacal grimaces, their hair as wild as Medusa's, arms flailing, spittle flying; but there is no paddy wagon big enough to carry them to Bedlam, no battalion large enough to corral them all, tether them, and get them off the streets once and for all.
'Where am I?', Vicki asked the attending physician on duty in Ward C, the violent ward; to which she received only a smile, a pat on the head, and a dose of clozapine.
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