Enduring the spew
There’s been a big, bulbous boil on the butt of America for years now. A few weeks ago, that boil was punctured. And as boils do after they are pricked, this boil emitted a toxic, noxious spew. In a matter of time that putrid spew will stop, as is the case with all popped boils. This boil was particularly big and bulbous, though, so we’ll just have to wait it out as it emits its nastiness.
Let’s now think about defeat. All of us have lost in our lives. We lost spelling bees, junior varsity football games, junior high volleyball games. We lost out on that pretty girl to that better-looking guy. We lost out on that job to that person who could afford a better education and/or had better connections. We lost out on that last affordable big-screen TV because we got in line a few minutes late on Black Friday.
We all had to learn how to lose. It’s part of life for all of us … or almost all of us.
Donald Trump never had to learn how to lose. When he got into disputes with his siblings, teachers or school administrators, his father always took his side. When he disobeyed his mother, his father always took his side. When he couldn’t get into his university of choice, someone took the entrance exam for him.
In the business world, he didn’t have to pay his dues, work under others or learn to take “no” for an answer, because his mega-rich Papa gave him a $400 million gift to go into business on his own, then bailed him out financially and otherwise for decades whenever things went awry.
He didn’t have to lose out to anyone when it came to beautiful women. He had the wealth to impress models, and when their beauty started to fade or the attraction started to wane, he simply could trade in that woman for another model … literally. He even bragged that his fame and money allowed him to grab random women by the vagina.
He didn’t even have to learn to lose at golf. He openly moved his ball, took Mulligans (meaning a free second shot after the first one goes awry), even hitting the balls of others in better position after claiming those balls as his. And when all of that didn’t result in a win, he cheated on his scorecard. Few questioned him about the rampant cheating because he usually owned the golf course.
So when Trump took a brutally humiliating beating as he did in the recent presidential election, he was not going to take it well, simply because he’d never learned to lose.
Despite what Trump apologists insist, it’s not about being hyper-competitive. Anyone who has ever competed against me in anything, from basketball to Trivial Pursuit to Cornhole, knows I hate to lose and will do anything within the rules to win. (Some who played basketball or football with me would say I sometimes tested the rules a tad.) When the game is over and I’ve lost, I’ll be angry, but mostly at myself. I’ll congratulate my opponent, think about ways to not lose to that person again, then immediately start implementing those efforts.
But Trump, who’s never had to learn how to lose, is now spewing nastiness like the punctured boil on the butt of America that he is. The disgusting spew is dissipating slowly, as is the case with any popped boil, and it will soon end.
The scary thing about popping boils, though, is sometimes a boil will come back more bulbous, nastier and more dangerous than it was the first time. We all need to be wary of that.