Wouldn’t it be nice if instead of always hearing the “I” word, we started hearing more “we?” It seems as if this country has been creating an entire society of narcissists. We have candidates that only use the singular pronoun. We have TV moderators who seem to think that the world should only care about their individual beliefs or thoughts (even if they are frequently wrong). We have talk show hosts that truly do the majority of the talking and treat their guests to diatribes and loud voices. (Why would one want to be a guest on Morning Joe or Hardball?) Is it any wonder that so many individuals seem to think that the rules don’t apply to them? They can shoot people in the back or pick and choose the laws they wish to follow because all that counts is “I.”

So here are some thoughts on rules that many dislike:

• Speed limits – most of them are absurd if one knows how to drive a car. And if one has a fast and fun car, the limits are highly annoying.
• Paying taxes – who likes to do that? And in D.C. it is rare that one gets one’s money back.
• Paying bills at all – how depressing it is to sit down and pay utility bills? Imagine if we all got electricity, water, gas, free? What a relief that would be! And, after all, why should we pay our mortgages? The money just goes to greedy banks who, even if you’ve been paying a mortgage faithfully for thirty years, now won’t let you refinance if you’re the Chairman of the Federal Reserve because somehow the paperwork is too complicated to calculate one’s trustworthiness.
• Pedestrian crossings – Why do we have to allow pedestrians to have the right of way? They are slow and often walk against the light breaking that rule so why shouldn’t we, the drivers, be able to break the rules in return?

Those are just a few rules that one hears others mumbling about or we dislike ourselves. Although I am writing slightly tongue-in-cheek today since it is hot and humid once again in D.C. and my horse is ready for cooler weather so we are all grouchy. It is true that it seems there is a diminishing thought process of the culture of “we,” the inclusiveness of what many thought was a strength of America. The thinking about one’s community even as we celebrate the individual used to be important to us.

Maybe as the weather turns to Fall, the plural first person pronoun will become more popular? At least some of us can hope so!