Sunday at Dad's

This place bustles with energy when my three young children and I get a good long stretch to experiment with all the activities any of us can imagine.



Today, while my oldest son (27) slept, I was having breakfast in the Castro with my Japanese companion. Afterward, went to Japantown, where she purchased a lovely bonsai tree for a friend who recently got married.



Back at my house, with the kids, the windows and doors are once again open, the heat continues, but today a hint of breeze conveys the idea that Fall indeed looms.



I'm quite sad that my lovely housemate has decided to move out. She is restless, and wants to travel overseas again. A new couple is poised to move in.



If this post seems to be going all over the place, there's a reason, which I'll get to presently.



I miss Michigan, my home state. Lately, whether by design, accident, or pure bad luck, several of my more pro-Obama posts have been circulated to a large list of Midwesterners, many of whom clearly feel quite differently about the candidates and the issues than those of us on the coasts do.

The amount of hate mail this has flooded me with is truly stunning.

Of course, none of these people, whoever they are (and I recognize almost none of their names) know me at all. They have never taken the time to read my ten-part series, "The Three E's in This Election," which cumulatively amounts to a 7,500 word essay about the serious economic, energy and environmental issues confronting our next President.

But some of the names I easily recognize, because they are my family members. I love them without qualification, but their comments cut me deeply, leaving me feeling utterly disenfranchised from my roots.

What is it about my voice that has so offended all of these good Americans.

If you do not know that I am a deeply conservative person, with deep family values, and an unending commitment to my society to help it become better, fairer, kinder, and more inclusive, than you truly do not know who I am.

If you do not know that I am a free-market entrepreneur, a defender of small business, and an opponent of Big Government and Big Business, than you have not been paying attention.

Finally, if you don't know that for me, family always comes first, and that I miss my dead parents with an unending pain, you have zero idea who I am. I love Michigan. I love America. I devoted my youth to my country's service as honestly and with as many serious health consequences as any military veteran.

The pain these messages have caused me is ineffable. I am like a voice screaming silently in an empty wilderness of neglect, my words not falling on receptive ears at all, but only inciting some of the cruelest and crudest language I have ever witnessed (even in a newsroom.)

God forbid any of my posts ever again reach these people. I cannot help fearing what they would do to our country if they ever again gained control of the federal government. On the other hand, I guess we all know what would happen, because we have just lived through the worst eight years in our lifetimes.

Do you like living in a country fighting a worthless and unjustified war? Do you like seeing your life savings disappear? Are you happy that climate change threatens your children and grandchildren's very survival?

If so, you truly do not know who David Weir is. But I love you just the same.

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