Lauren, I feel your pain. We---thoughtful people who care, who want to do what's right and see it being done throughout our country---are afflicted with a seriously-disturbed sociopath in the White House, enabled by the geriatric kindergarteners in the Senate and Administration. They want power, pealth, and privilege; the rights of the 99% to decent, comfortable lives, free from economic want, social and political decadence, be damned.

I've been working in white collar jobs for the last half of my adolescence and all my adult life; I started working in 1968 and am still employed, full-time. Can I retire? Perhaps, if I'm willing to eat lots of ramen soups, and live in a tent under a freeway overpass, praying that my health won't decline too much.

I took my first vacation in seven years last September, and traveled throughout Italy for two weeks. What an AMAZING country! My next trip will be to southern France, and possibly Spain.

And, believe me, I've thought long and hard about moving to Barcelona, Nice, or Siena. As tempting as it is to move to Europe, the shame of America is too great a burden for me. So, I write, I talk, I champion doing "the right thing," here in Los Angeles, hoping against hope that my actions will leave a positive legacy for those I eventually will leave behind.

It's tough--but, in the end, dying while fighting is better for one's soul than living on one's knees.