Welcome to 2025, a New Year; one which has such rich promise.

One of these promises is unanticipated opportunities for more trappings of success. More will be revealed in the upcoming few months, and the trick for survival, and to thrive in the current stream of shifting allegiances amid the looming litany of uncertainties, is individual choice.

Yes, you get to choose how you think, how you feel, and how you react after the ratification of the 2024 election results.

I continue to meet people who still feel deep despair about the outcome of the presidential election. Some have not been able to accept how the country has revealed itself to be more socially and religiously conservative, more fearful of "others," i.e., the foreign-born, LGBTQIA+ persons, and more racist.

Were we living in a bubble, and as some have suggested, becoming more “elitist” in our embrace of increasingly liberal ideas? Was our expectation to secure an egalitarian future such a sharp departure from "middle" Americans’ reality? How did we become so deluded to think that the country would go in a better direction under the Democrats, and not the Republicans? What did we miss?

Are we guilty of being out of touch? No, we too are Americans, and our zeal for more, better, is legitimate, too.

But what will that mean as we move forward under the new normal, a state in which an economy, society, settles following a crisis.

The phrase was popularized in a 1966 science fiction novel, “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” by Robert Heinlein, describing life in a rebellious penal colony on the moon, which was in a crisis.

Heinlein is known for his futuristic thinking and said, through a fictional character, “….a dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”

That is so prescient of what is happening after the re-election of Donald J. Trump: the new normal.

In an earlier column, I said the fears of wholesale disaster under the new, old administration need to be waited out, that all is not a total loss, and we need to keep a positive outlook.

To help me keep my peaceful state, I have coined a new phrase: C.A.N.T., meaning “cannot actually normalize this.”

We C.A.N.T.: The man and his dastardly predilections. His policies and influencers (The Heritage Institute, Project 2025). His world view, elimination of NATO, shifting alliances and affection toward authoritarian rulers. The Jan. 6, 2024, insurrection. Those un-qualified appointments. The best friends, Musk, Miller, Bezos, to name only a few in the public eye. The list of C.A.N.Ts. is long.

So, what are we to do?

I believe that Black folk can and should still attempt to save this upside-down world.

Consider this: Black folk simply have not gone away despite all the efforts to erase us from America. Our rate of survival must be mind-boggling against all the aggressions, murderous physical labor, denigrating racist laws, policies, and practices, overt and covert attempts to eliminate us by lynching, rape, wrongful convictions, over-incarceration, to name a few such acts of terrorism against Blacks.

We’re survivors; we will thrive in the new normal. How?

First, we need to have more children if we can feed, house, clothe, and educate them. Just saying.

Look behind the curtain to see why abortion has been so rigorously denied by white men, for their women.

They understand the value of reproducing themselves.

Once again, we need to practice a mentality of collective benefit; focus on building up our institutions: churches, fraternities/sororities, and other self-affirming organizations.

It is imperative to grow and support Black-owned business by pooling resources, leveraging our brain-trusts and financial assets.

In this age of a new normal, we should return to the beginning when mostly all we had was one another; before we joined the great American race in pursuit of happiness, wealth, and individualism.

The new normal also demands that we not only pull back to our center, but we must remember to run low, and in a zig zag.