Perhaps this was the week when we thought the world would start to heal itself, when a new sort of leadership would emerge to replace the dark days of the past few years.
There is room for a disrupter in every business, be it politics or life in general. Somebody who would challenge the status quo, someone who will rattle the chairs, leave the paintings at a wrong angle, shout too loud and become an agitator in a place of calm.
Thankfully, we have never needed to look to the White House for our moral guidance. But what has emerged in the past four years has been an acceptance of allowing discourse to sink to unplumbed depths. It’s more than the “biglies” and the overused tremendously wonderful greats.
Everyone has their idiosyncrasies, but when such behaviour is allied to a coarse ugliness, it becomes a problem, not just for those who live in that country, but for all the other countries who are influenced by that country’s culture, power and trends.
It is when people begin to see it as a currency for living their live that it becomes a problem. It legitimises the use of insulting language, of inciting hatred, of creating An Other, of denying science, or trying to bring us back to the dark ages.
And so at time of writing this, there is a shadow hanging over the gradually unfolding results of the American election. We are in that place, that strange feeling you get when your team has just drawn an All-Ireland and you are left there high in the Cusack, stunned, knowing that you have to go through the whole thing again.
By the time this paper comes out next week, America may have a new President...or it may have the old one back again... or maybe neither of these options will apply. Whoever wins will have the job of healing a nation, of knitting the broken hearts back together... or the task of throwing further fuel on the fire.
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It has been a dark week in Galway too; in particular for the seafaring Oliver family who have given so much to the city and to their community and who are now grieving. Our hearts go out to them for their sad losses, as they say farewell to two good men, Tom and Martin who both died this week. There is not one among us who has not shed a tear at the hearing of this sad news. To the entire family, please know that the city is wrapping its wide arms around you this morning.
