Not long ago, some friends and I went to a pub to listen to a traditional music session (for your listening pleasure, above.) One of them got talking with an older gentleman she knew from my little village, which prompted another friend – who grew up nearby — to begin the fascinating process of ‘tracing.’  Where did he go to school, she asked. Oh, thus and such a school, says he. It turns out they went to the same school, he long before she. Oh, so you probably knew my cousin/neighbor/family friend, she says. Well, he did as it happens. And if he knew that person, did he also know her father? Oh you mean, Johnny Joe? He did indeed. And on it went until they had firmly established their place in the nature of things.

Tracing is just as natural as breathing for the Irish. I see it most often in the chance meeting of two people from my neck of County Clare, who get right down to it after introductions. They will talk about specific roads and townlands (a small part of a village within the village), specific people who might be long dead but that both once knew, or a classmate who moved away. But I’ve seen it played out between Irish people who live in far-flung parts of the country as well. That conversation might take a little longer, but they will eventually find the neighbor/cousin/friend that connects them.

Of all the wonderful attributes of the Irish people, tracing is among the most endearing to me. Fact is, every time I see it happen, I just sit back with a smile on my face and listen, an engaged witness.

I’ve thought a lot about tracing lately, its innate humanity. And I wonder. Once that common bond is found, could that not be the start of a connection that might extend beyond placenames and second cousins? If the conversation veered toward more weighty matters, would you not perhaps give him wider berth for his opinions and beliefs if they differ from yours, because you share a similar background, because he knows your mother? If someone were to ridicule him, say, might you not more easily stand up for him for just that very same reason? Could not familiarity breed if not respect, then something a whole lot closer to it than contempt?

I think about what it would be like if Americans were like the Irish. Impractical, of course. America has 334 million people; Ireland, 6 million. But still. Humor me. Let’s say a rancher from Montana met a college professor from Boston (I hope you will allow me a broad stereotype), and their first act was tracing. Oh, I spent a summer in Montana when I was in college, and I so enjoyed being there. Where were you? Outside Billings, a place called X. I know that ranch. John Jones’ place. Good man. And let’s say they spent the next few minutes talking about Montana, the professor reminiscing about its beauty and generosity of spirit and the rancher happy to bask in the glow of a state he loves. When, as would likely be inevitable, the conversation turned toward more weighty matters, they may quickly realize they have nothing further in common. But instead of descending into pat political invective, perhaps they agree to disagree, maybe even leave their hackles down as they tentatively talk, maybe leave the conversation with some food for thought. Oh, the cynic in me says, this would never happen. Oh, the optimist in me says, why not?

I say nothing new when I say that the fabric of America is fraying in a way that can only occur when its people are so deeply divided as they are today. Anyone who reads this blog will likely know that I woke up on Nov. 6 bereft. I do not think I have to list for any of you, those who agree and those who don’t, the very different visions of America Donald Trump and I embrace. That he won both the popular and electoral college vote convincingly was, for me, deeply disheartening.

In the days after the election, as is my wont (the journalist in me holding on tenaciously), I took a rather deep dive into the ‘why’ and how’. I felt I had to try and understand. As many of you no doubt know, it seems that a whole bunch of Americans who might typically have voted Democratic in the past chose to vote for Trump. Urban union folk, young people, Latino and black men, women – he made gains among all of these people. And when added to his 40% or so ‘MAGA base,’ these folks tipped the scales.

Reporting indicates that people were voting with their pocketbooks, that stubborn inflation and the high price of commodities, coupled with Trump’s consistent rhetoric that the country was spiraling downward out of control, spurred them to take a chance on him. But I find that logic flawed. They were willing to set aside the criminal conviction, the misogyny, the racism, the xenophobia, the transphobia, in essence the contempt with which he holds so many. They appeared to choose the individual over the community, and that is difficult for me to understand.

The thought occurs to me nonetheless that it would be instructive to sit at a kitchen table or pull up a bar stool next to one of these voters. To make them as a group evil, to make me and my political kind the shining knight belies the very notion of community. Would that it were possible for Americans to trace. Now more than ever. Then, having established your  bona fides, you might be able to discern why that single mother cast her ballot. Why that Latino man. We could find the humanity in them, so that they might find the humanity in us. Because right now, it’s just noise, Babel, vitriol.

The US election is not the only one being held in November. The Irish head to the polls to vote in their general election on Nov. 29. I’d like to share with you a few of the priorities of the major parties: Create more housing, across the board a priority, including significant gains in government housing for those of moderate and low income; lower child care costs, to as little as €200 a month per child, with the government picking up the rest of the tab; increase the tax credit the government offers to renters to defray their costs; ratchet up the number of Garda, to take on organized drug crime, provide more community policing and crack down on distracted/drunk/speeding drivers; expand supports for small businesses.

Sinn Fein and the Green Party favor investment in public transportation, €1 billion for Sinn Fein, €10 billion (perhaps not surprisingly) for the Greens.

Fianna Fail wants to extend free doctor’s visits to everyone under 12. Fine Gael wants to invest in more domestic violence shelters and expand special education services.

Sinn Fein wants to make significant investments in the country’s public hospitals; the Greens see a need to increase pay for early childhood educators, who are fleeing the profession.

A number of other parties skew further left than these. There are a couple of right-of-center parties, too, and I suspect they might gain traction in this election, particularly as regards their closed-door immigration policy which may be attractive to some. But on balance, the parties are practically bending over backward to put out platforms with the welfare of the country’s citizens at heart.

And I know in my gut, it all comes down to tracing. If a candidate for TD (like a member of Congress, writ small) knocks on someone’s door, you know the tracing is going to begin almost immediately. I knew your grandmother. My sister taught your children. Right away that connection. Now, the resident may then feel emboldened to tell the candidate just how awful this or that government program is, but those pronouncements probably more often than not are said with a twinkle in the eye. I would wager even the prime minister (the taoiseach) engages in tracing as he wends his way across the country. So if he knows Susie Q in County Clare, who gave him an earful, is influential in her community and to boot knows his cousin, he’s going to be mindful of that when he heads back to Dublin.

In this uncertain time of increased climate-induced disasters, protectionist policies, shifting political alliances and further disparity of income, it’s important for us to know our place in the nature of things. The more the faceless evil becomes the face of a struggling mother or a black man trying to hold his life together, the more connections however tenuous we can make across the divide, the more it seems to me that we prosper for the benefit of all.

May Pollyana find purchase on the mountain.