I’ve been wondering what we will talk about this summer as we travel across our divided country. Part of the joy of vacation is meeting new people, striking up conversations with strangers on ferry boats and in coffee houses. Or catching up with far-off family and friends you haven’t seen for years.

But what do we bring up after we say, “How you doing?” It’s a minefield out there.

Conversational etiquette used to call for avoiding the subjects of politics and religion. But in this scrappy environment almost all roads lead to one or the other.

The weather would normally be a safe topic. Who can argue which way the wind is blowing, but what causes it is something else.  Say something like “Nice day, but a little off for July, don’t you think?” and you could prompt a big debate over climate change. You might add something like, “We are really messing up the planet” and find yourself facing off with a local who thinks all scientists should be fired and it’s all in God’s plan that the polar bears learn to swim better.

Shall I assume by the flag on your T-shirt you are my kind of American?  Or the other kind?

You might innocently open a newspaper on a park bench next to someone who hates the media. You might ask a stranger where he gets his news and if he said, “I watch Rachel” would you give him a high-five or roll your eyes? And if she said, “O’Reilly’s my man,” would you get up and walk away?

We can get on Congress for having no interest in reaching across the aisle but apparently Greater America has a similar paralysis of cooperation.  We don’t agree on who should get married, who should have children and who should decide when they should have them. We don’t even agree on birth control which we thought we had long agreed on.

A Pew Research poll reported that as a country we are at near historic odds.  Democrats are more to the left and Republicans more to the right than in recent history and there’s a big wash of independents in between, and who knows what they’re thinking.

If we mapped our vacation route by stereotype think of how many disagreeable places we might have to avoid. Can’t go to that anti-immigrant state. Or the one where they let you bring guns into the bar.  Whoa, isn’t this the state that wants to kill Planned Parenthood? Is this the one owned by Big Oil?

Yeah, and I live in a state where everyone grows pot in the zucchini patch.

Oh people, can’t we get along? Probably not likely, especially not this year. Americans are said to be more polarized along partisan lines than at any time in the last 25 years.

If you don’t like unions or think Citizens United is dandy I’m not sure we have much more to say. And if I tell you I listen to NPR and I’m really rooting for the nuns am I going to lose you?

And while we can agree that theses are hard times for most of us you may think it’s my guy’s fault and I think it’s your guy’s fault. And you think my guy has to go. And I think your guy will make it worse.

So, read any good books lately?

I think I get it. It’s a 50 year old grudge. They’re still mad about the Pill. The birth control pill turned the power game upside down more than 50 years ago and some people are still honked off about it.  Reliable woman-controlled contraception changed many things.  The Pill became forever linked to the sexual revolution, women’s liberation, cultural change, even consumer activism. All the things some people wish they could reverse.

As the Republican presidential campaign continues its jaw-dropping mission to control women’s bodies it’s clear that one way the hard right would take this country back is to drag women back a half century.

If you weren’t around to remember, ask your mother or grandmother what it was like after the Pill put women in charge of their bodies. They didn’t have to leave birth control up to the man who promised, “Trust me, I’ll take care of it.”

Not anymore. Women took control. Discreetly.  Your man didn’t need to know, or your mother, or the church.

A woman in charge of her future could plan her life, develop a career, start up a rock band, finish med school.  She could decide when or whether to have children. She could enjoy sex. For another pre-Pill reminder,  watch Mad Men.

In her book When Everything Changed, The History of American women from 1960 to the present, Gail Collins quotes the Economist magazine as crediting the Pill for being one invention that historians a thousand years from now will say defined the Twentieth Century.

In 2010 we celebrated the 50^th anniversary of the Pill, confident that reliable birth control was taken care of. Today’s young women could feel assured that reproductive choices were “like the air and water, simply there when you need them,” writes  Gloria Feldt in her book No Excuses, about women and power.

But apparently some weren’t celebrating, but brooding, waiting for their chance to pounce and show women who’s boss.

Our current attackers are not all crusty old guys, the fools who think sexist jokes are funny. Some are young enough to be Phyllis Schlafly’s grandsons.  But their message is the same – that women, the poor dears, are simply incapable of knowing what’s best for their bodies.

The feverish Rick Santorum would get rid of abortion, birth control, prenatal testing and amniocentesis. Who knows what he’ll go after next. Virginia legislators pushed by the governor tried to force women to have an intrusive vaginal ultrasound prior to an abortion. Against her will. Whether she wants it or not. Non-consensual penetration of the vagina or, at worst -  in the case of Virginia – state rape. At best, politicians wanting to play doctor.

Former Congresswoman Pat Schroeder said “If you had told me when I was in law school birth control would be a debate in 2012 I would have thought you were nuts.”

Fortunately women started talking back. In Virginia they organized a silent protest, staring down state legislators going to vote against women. And Gov. Vaginal Ultrasound backed off.  Activists in Ohio labeled their anti-women Republicans “masters of the Uterus.” Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney demanded “Where are the women?” and led a walkout to protest a male-only panel dealing with contraception.

What’s seldom mentioned is that the Pill not only prevents an unwanted pregnancy but helps protect against uterine and ovarian cancer. It’s used to control endometriosis. It lessens migraines. And in its early years it turned women into their own health advocates. Concerned about the side affects from the heavy estrogen dose women pressured manufacturers to adjust the dosage. And they did. And women realized they had power as consumers.

Well, all of this has just been too much for too long for some people, mostly men, I’m sorry to say. Powerful women are obviously a menace to society and must be stopped.

That is our challenge then, for modern women and men to resist these 19^th century throwbacks. If we don’t, we will leave a legacy for our grandchildren that will cause more pain and suffering than any whopping national debt.

At a themed dinner party we brought dishes based on our individual heritage which is why our gastronomical surprise included Sephardic meatballs, sauerkraut, chopped liver and Rhum Babka.   It’s such an American thing, to dredge up treasures from the Old World.

And that is why it’s perplexing when Republican presidential candidates who want to lead this country and represent it in the world, act like they couldn’t possibly have any ties or interest in anything beyond the good old USA.  One candidate chided another for speaking a second language. The other guy knows French he sneered, as if it were something to be ashamed of. Who could you possibly offend by speaking two languages?

That same candidate decries the entire Spanish language even though it happens to be the second largest language spoken in the United States. He calls it the language of the ghetto. The first immigrants on American soil spoke Spanish.  Spanish is the second most widely taught language in the United States…followed by French.

And then there’s the Europe-haters.  We finally got past that Freedom Fries nonsense and now there’s a whole new round of Europe-bashing. When they run out of ways to attack President Obama they accuse him of “taking his political inspiration from Europe.  Voters must choose between “a European-style welfare state” or “a free land,” says one contender.

Given that the U.S. was founded by people from Europe and the population swollen by Italians, Irish, Germans, Russians, Poles – you name it – this anti-European English-only rhetoric would seem to be turning on our own roots.

The Republican candidates hold to a blind belief that everything America does is best, that we have no need to look beyond our shores for any guidance or inspiration. We don’t need their language. We don’t need their ideas. We don’t need their health care plans and we’ll deal with carbon emissions our way.

We’re Francophobes, Hispanophobes, monolingual, mono-thinking and proud.

The issue comes close to home now because Santa Rosa (Ca.) is getting a French-American school. When I first read about it I thought it a bon-bon of an idea. I love going to France. I like that my granddaughter’s pre-ballet dance teacher counts out the tempo… un, deux trois.  I don’t think anyone  thinks her un-American for saying “bonjour” to a bunch of five-year-olds in pink tights.

And yet regarding the French American school there was criticism. French is charming, but Spanish is essential, seeing as how our population includes so many children whose first language is Spanish. What we really need in the North Bay are more schools with a Spanish-English curriculum.

I want my little white grandkids of mixed European ancestry whose mother tongue is American English and live in California and Texas to study Spanish. Know it. Use it. Put it on their resume. Learning to speak a second language will make them worldly. But learning Spanish will help them be local.

Might even help were they to run for president.  Que fastidio!  (Means good grief in Spanish. I had to look it up.)