I wake up wondering what on earth happened.

            It’s a cliché of course, the astonishment of hindsight. We’re all Rip van Winkle more or less, dozing through our time, blinking dumbfounded at the changes wrought while we dreamt. From the onset of consciousness in college till now, I thought I knew where I was. Only occasionally taken by surprise – by assassinations, accidents, the rise of Trump – did I feel lost. Yet reviewing my half century, I can hardly make heads or tails of our nation’s trajectory or my own.

            What on earth happened!

            I chop the whole into chunks to digest more easily. What happened in Government, Community, Communications, Technology, Science, the Arts? How about Food, Climate, World Affairs, Language, Customs, Fashion, Mental Health? All “changed, changed utterly,” in Yeats’ haunting refrain. How did I change my times in my little way? How did my times change me?

            I feel for themes. Generalizations are shredded by exceptions, yet we strive to make sense: we were on this crossing together, and our passage feels different than our predecessors’. If my dad rose from his grave after five-plus decades, how would I explain?

            I’d begin with the decline of community. Mid-twentieth century, most Americans still lived in neighborhoods and knew their neighbors. Our places defined us, they were not just addresses. In my town, we knew the mayor, pastor, postman, headmaster, pharmacist, proprietors of many stores. Local sports heroes were a big deal. We had our own newspaper – locally owned – and bank – and hospital – and pride. Responsible to our neighbors, we behaved responsibly, lest we be repelled as a pariah. Sure, folks moved away, “relocated” – a verb of my lifetime – but the core of community persisted and felt permanent.

            Communications, commerce, technology, and mobility insensibly, inexorably corroded community. Zip codes were where we lived, not who we were. Local newspapers were supplanted by chains, then the Internet. Local businesses were “rolled up.” Malls mauled downtowns. Folks moved away. Relationships shrank to acquaintances. Families, too, fractured, as happiness became an expectation, even a right. No one worried about happiness when I was a kid. You did what you were born to.

            The less we were bound to one another, the more abominably we behaved. This is human nature: if I need your help, I won’t punch you out. My dad would be appalled at the incivility of our everyday discourse. I’m getting used to it, alas.

            Prolonged peace and prosperity made us nastier, more selfish, grumpier. During crises we cohere to survive: all for one and one for all. At our ease we grow fussy, less aware of the plight of others. My father’s foreign war was noble, heroic, worth it. My lifetime’s wars have been skirmishes comparatively – and discreditable. Were we wasting lives to enrich plutocrats and empower politicians? What did America stand for, anyway?

            Loss of community, urgency, purpose, confidence in our goodness greased our skid to today’s rancor and Trump. We had much of what we wanted but what we wanted wasn’t what we wanted. Grumpiness is a virus. Nothing made us glad anymore, no institution or leader merited our respect: not church, government, religion, academia, science, generals… To hell with the lot of them, with America for that matter, let’s elect a clown to trash the joint with his antics, what difference can it make?

            When all hell breaks loose, you can join the hell-raisers, oppose them, or try to hide. The badness of our moment made me better. I enlisted in the army of decency and truth. My Hitler has no mustache but he’s a threat as dire.