It’s time for people to act stoopit. It’s the winter holiday season, which is truly a holley daze. It’s different this year, though, what with COVID and all. Not sure how many people will be putting a pack of masks under the tree, though. When I was a kid, there was always the cadre of aunt and great-aunts who always gifted underwear or socks for Christmas. Except for that one great-aunt who gave me that medieval battle set with a working catapult; my favorite gift of all time.

Anyway, it’s a weird time for a lot of people, myself included. It’s been a little odd for me since my mother died. We had traditions for Thanksgiving and Christmas, even before I had moved away from home. Until she died, I had never in my life missed spending a Thanksgiving or Christmas with my mother. Even when things were tense between us, even when I had a hangover and had to throw up in the restuarant bathroom, we were somehow together on those days. The loss is palpable more than three years after her death; it may always be.

Christmas was always my favorite, because my birthday was so close to it. Everyone was well trained to not attempt the “one big present for Christmas AND your birthday”. I did not play that for as long as I can remember. They were accustomed to my willfulness, from the beginning – I was supposed to come on or before Christmas, but I didn’t show up. The next logical estimate for delivery was January 1st, but I didn’t come then either. I came in between, on the 29th, and that’s the facts, Jack. I did it my way, and it was a rough ride, so don’t be tryin’ to combine gift events.

My sobriety anniversary is also in December, on the 7th, and that is certainly a day that shall live in infamy. For a few months I thought the day I last drank was January 6th, but friends who were in my orbit that night said it was the 7th 33 years ago, so there you have it. The free world thanks me.

This is going to be a holiday period of contemplation and reflection for me, I think. I have been on the job hunt again, and a friend in recovery helped me redesign my resume’. I put this new one out there in the online search engines, and it looks as though I had a little interest. I am waiting on a recruiter for a company to schedule an interview for me with the IT hiring manager. He said it would probably be after the first of the year, so I’m OK with that.

I’m OK with waiting on the interview, but of course that gives me a lot of time to go into the usual self-doubt territory. They will know I can’t do the job as soon as I open my mouth, I surmise. They will see me as being too old and want more details about why I departed my last job. I will stick my foot in my mouth. Specific technical questions will be asked that I cannot answer. And so on, and so on, and so fucking on. That makes me really tired.

Right now, I am taking self-doubt as just a part of how I roll, just a small piece of who I am. It seems that I need to accept that and drive on. That seems to be working reasonably well, until the sun goes down and the night is dark and I have solitary time on my hands. I’m not sleeping incredibly well, but more days than not I wake up feeling as though I actually slept. I think my average is five-six hours, and that’s much better than two or three hour naps in sequence.

I’ve been having odd dreams, some of which I don’t remember days later, but I know that I’ve had them. That leads me to believe that not only do I have some things going on in my sub-conscious mind, but I am sleeping deeply enough to allow the journey. One night I dreamed that I wrecked my truck not one, not two, not three but FOUR times in succession. It was very weird. I was told long ago that driving dreams or vehicular accident dreams signify issues with control. That would make sense, because right now I feel as though my life is mostly out of control. Go figure.

The whole planet is out of control, though. Kyle Rittenhouse is becoming a star of the conservative crowd since his acquittal for…I don’t even know exactly what. Suffice it to say he was not convicted for acts that resulted in the death of two people at a protest march in Kenosha WI. As with the OJ verdict many years ago, it seems there was a demographic split in folks’ reactions to the verdict. More Black/African-Americans and people of color seemed to land unequivocally on the side of doubting his innocence and convinced of his guilt. More whites seemed to land on the side of giving him the benefit of the doubt, or believing his self-defense trial strategy. And so it goes. The twain may never meet.

The trial of Kim Potter, the former police officer in Minneapolis who mistook her firearm for a taser and killed Daunte Wright, has ended. The jury is showing all indications that it may be deadlocked on a verdict. Any verdict has to be unanimous, apparently, and the jurors have been wrestling with the evidence and their options for conviction. Potter herself testified, and sobbed uncontrollably during parts of her testimony. Some I’ve spoken with believe her remorse to be sincere, and give her the benefit of the doubt that a veteran officer could have confused a taser with a firearm. Others, however, are convinced her tears are disingenuous, and an obvious attempt to influence the jury. They believe she was displaying a sincere sense of remorse. Once again, the dividing line for those opposite sentiments appears to be racial, with people of color more likely to believe that she’s full of the brown stuff, while dominant culture folks are more likely to believe that she made a horrible mistake for which she is genuinely remorseful. *sigh*

I don’t believe the Rittenhouse trial should have yielded no legal consequences for him. He shouldn’t have had the gun in the first place, since when it was purchased by his mommy it was illegal for him to have it because of his age. He shouldn’t have had the gun at a public event that was likely to have confrontations and unrest. He shouldn’t have thought he was the avenging angel for unnamed businesses that were going to be looted and demolished – that was a conspiracy myth perpetrated by white supremacy groups to throw shade on their mortal enemy Black Lives Matter supporters. I don’t understand why there was absolutely no consequence for this little twerp, and yeah I do believe that if he had been a Black kid he would never have made it to trial. He was openly carrying the assault rifle he came there with, and had it been a Black person the Kenosha police would most likely have shot him dead before finding out that he was “trying to protect businesses”.

In the case of Kim Potter, I don’t quite know what to think. I would hate to find out that she acted to purposefully kill Daunte Wright. I would hate to find out that her tears were simply a good acting job. I know police incidents are generally loud, and chaotic, and disorienting. Unfortunately, if you are carrying a lethal weapon I would hope your training allowed you to maintain your faculties enough to realize that a taser does not weigh the same as a firearm. It’s hard for me to fathom that such a thing, even in the fog of combat, could happen. But the story is almost too fantastic to be summarily disbelieved. As so it goes. Again.

The cases of Kyle Rittenhouse and Kim Potter are just the latest in the slew of police-involved killings in America over the past few years. That’s where the problem really emerges, because if it was not for COVID right now, we might be in full-on hostilities on our streets. Because of COVID, people are not willing to take on a physical battle over race; they are content to die on the hill of a piece of fabric that should cover the nose and mouth. The anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers are annoying, in my book. It’s about control, and “you can’t make me do something I don’t want to do because I have rights”. This is about “I’m not eating my vegetables and I’ll hold my breath until I turn blue”. So be it, but it seems awfully silly.

I don’t care if someone else doesn’t want to mask or get the vaccine. That’s fine, but just stay the hell away from me. No, you can’t come into this place of business without a mask and/or a vaccine. No, I don’t believe your claim of medical exemption that excuses you from wearing a mask. If you were really that sensitive to risks like COVID you wouldn’t be in a public place in the first place. You’d want to stay away from people without masks more than just about anyone else, on the outside chance that all the reports about risk ARE true.

So, I’m one of those people who figures that on the outside chance the information we have about COVID is all true I’m staying home as much as I can. No big crowds, in fact no indoor gatherings with more than 10 people (like at the beginning of all this). I have been poked in the arm three separate times with the Pfizer vaccine, and consider it a small price to pay for even a hint of prevention. I still mask when indoors. I limit my time in public areas as much as possible. I consider all of those mitigation measure a choice that I am more than willing to make. I’m certainly not going to be dredging up a cough to make other people uncomfortable if I can’t get my way about not wearing a mask in a public accommodation. Grow up, y’all.

Christmas Day for me will probably be spent like my other days have been spent lately, communing with the dog and watching multiple episodes of NCIS: New Orleans. If the weather is nice, I may go for a drive in the mountains or something. If I’m smart, I’ll clean up a bit because this place now has a decorating scheme that I call “Early Crack House”. *sigh*

We’ll go on, and some of us will sputter and raise hell about going on, but it will be what it’s going to be. I’ll wait and see. Hopefully, I will be pleasantly surprised with a job offer in January, or at least with descending rates of COVID infection. Having a job would change a lot of things for me right now, and I am so overjoyed to even have the prospect of employment. Seriously.

Ya know, I am not going gently into the good night of aging. I’m frustrated and annoyed that I’m just now figuring out that some of the “failures” I’ve had along the way may not be entirely my fault. It’s not even a question of forgiving myself, just having the benefit of more information.

For instance, I have known for a long time that I have strengths and challenges (I started off saying “weaknesses” but thought better of it). There are certain things I get easily, and certain things I can bang my head on the well of knowledge and all I will get from that is a headache. Same as everybody else.

I’m just now coming to terms with how I learn, and that it’s on the fringes of the common style. I need to have a new lesson shown to me before I can begin to learn it. Show me what the outcome is supposed to be, and then leave me alone and let me put my hands on it, wiggle it around a few times, experiment a tiny bit. It’s not instantaneous, and it may take me a few revolutions of practice before I can demonstrate that I’ve learned the lesson. Furthermore, if I don’t repeat it often, I will sometimes forget it for a time until I can reorient myself.

That’s not a totally aberrant style of learning, but it’s not terribly common, at least in business anyway. It’s one of the reasons I couldn’t fit there, but I didn’t understand that fully. They said I had a lack of follow-through and lacked a sense of urgency. What the fuck ever, y’all. Just a polite way of saying they had written me off as a slacker at best, and a dunce at worst.

I believe I lacked the self-awareness to demand better, if not simply different, ways to work in that environment. They are so full of self-inflated value to the organization that anyone who gets a complaint about being too slow, or too forgetful, gets a black mark and put on a list somewhere. Being on a black mark list in corporate America is not a good thing. It means you’re being separated from the herd. Eventually you’ll get picked off.

I got picked off, and it’s the way it was supposed to be. My time without a formal job has given me time to learn things like this and to become more self-aware and more self-respectful. For that, I’m very grateful. But…if you’re listening Universe…I think I have some competence now, so a job offer would be really groovy.

Anyway, the world could use a time-out like the one I’ve had, where you don’t have to be grinding away at something you truly believe does not matter in the general scheme of things. That’s when work becomes drudgery, and you question why the hell you’re still doing the same thing and expecting different results. Nations continuing to uphold their status quo are not becoming more self-aware, they are holding on to tradition and past successes without understanding things have changed. The planet has changed, resources have changed, ideas have changed. Accordingly, how we all fit together has changed drastically and we need new paradigms.

I’ve had a couple of experiences lately; maybe more than a couple. Similar things may have occurred all along, but if I wasn’t aware enough to notice I missed them. I found a book in my cluttered living room the other day that made me giggle a bit. It was Thich Nhat Hanh’s book The Miracle of Mindfulness. (If there’s a way to underline on WordPress, I’m totally missing it, so bold will have to do.)

I giggled when I found that book, a brand new paperback that had never been opened because I realized a long-ago good intention of becoming more mindful. I bought the book at a UU national conference many years ago, but, well…the impetus to explore mindfulness flew the coop. But the coop is still there, and the impetus has come home to roost.

Over the past year, I’ve become more interested in mindfulness, and have been attempting to learn about it and find ways to experience it. For me, it has a lot to do with setting my intention for moving through the world. Then, I do what is bidden by my intention and pay attention to whether that is in the right relationship with my environment.

For me, this is easier said than done, because I often forget my intention moments after setting it. I’m sure I am not alone, but it can be frustrating to experience that constantly. It seems to go a little better when I meditate on the intention, but I remain prone to flapping about and gesturing obscurely after setting it. Ah, well…more practice is necessary.

While contemplating the pursuit of more mindfulness, I have been dealing with the tiny new psychiatric resource. She’s a nice lady who I fear may break if I speak too loudly, but I have no reason to doubt her competence. She’s not my primary therapist and I only need her to do medication management, but there’s a bit of wholistic effort that needs to occur. She has to see the whole picture of who I am and how I am so that she understands precisely how I should be medicated.

I’ve been on the same anti-depressants for a while now, but for the past few months, I’ve had some breakthrough low-level depression. So, we’re dealing with that. I also let her know, as I have with my other medical professionals and my therapist, that I don’t feel “sharp” these days. I forget things more often than ever, which is unnerving (especially since I have less to remember than ever). I told her about a similar conversation with my neurologist, wherein I explained how frightened I am that I am beginning to slowly move into the beginning of dementia as my mother did. This is about the same age my mother started to decline very subtly until there was no way to treat it or compensate for it. I don’t want that to happen to me.

Somewhere in the midst of discussing the lack of “sharpness” and the memory issues, the nice lady started talking about things like ADHD. My ears pricked up because I had talked with the previous psychiatric resource about that. After a fairly long talk about the possibility that I had symptoms of ADHD that could be causing memory problems and the mild brain fogginess I am experiencing.

So, the first suggestion was a Ritalin-like drug, which I declined almost immediately because it is a stimulant. I don’t need the possibility of more addiction triggers, so thanks but no thanks. Next, she suggested a non-prescription “medical supplement” called LumaTC that I might want to try. I looked it up and found nothing scary about it. I consulted with my neurologist, who likewise said there didn’t seem to be anything contained in the ingredients that would cause me any problems, so…off I went to order it. It’s not covered by insurance, of course, but I paid for it and they sent it immediately. I started taking it as soon as it arrived, but it hasn’t been a full week since I began so I am reserving judgment. It has a lot of B-vitamins in it, and that can’t be all bad.

So, the next step was to have an ADHD test, which she ordered. The office called to schedule, and it was supposed to happen this past Monday. I arrived at the designated time and waited. The front desk lady said, “Before you pay, let me just make sure of some things…how old are you?” I said 60, almost 61, but wondered why she was asking since my records indicate date of birth and so on. She then called another staff member, who rather officiously joined her at the front desk. They bumped their foreheads together on the computer monitor. Hmmm.

After a couple of minutes, the dynamic duo called me back to the desk to explain that I was actually too old to take the ADHD test; it’s more commonly given to people under 60. The officious one said it might not be accurate if they gave it to someone over 59 years, 12 months, and 31 days. WTF???

They checked with the little one who had ordered the test, and then asked me if I remember her mentioning anything about the age limit. I wanted to laugh when they asked if I remembered – that’s why I’m wanting to have the test because I cannot remember shit. CRS = Can’t Remember Shit, and I have it. I said I vaguely remembered that age had been mentioned but I thought that was about whether or not the insurance was going to pay for it or not.

More bumping of heads and muttering, then they decided it was essentially futile to perform the test. I was crushed. It must have shown because I don’t have a poke face AT ALL. The less officious of the two looked at me intently, and when our eyes met, I spontaneously coughed out, “I just want to know what’s wrong with me.”

That was a surprise. I did not realize how “wrong” I feel these days. That kind of sucks, but no wonder I am having breakthrough depression. I wrote a note to my primary therapist about it, and we’ll talk about it. I have another appointment with the tiny one in two weeks, so I am sure we’ll talk about it as well.

My normally delayed processing has revealed some feelings of aggravation concerning this abortive transaction on Monday. Do these folks not talk to each other? Do they not read the patient notes when there’s a test with exceptions they will perform, maybe to be sure the patient in question can be tested? Again…WTF? The crushing feeling didn’t last all that long, but it’s there in slightly reduced intensity. I’m glad it’s low-level but still annoying that I have it at all.

So, I have returned to circling the landing strip for a bit longer. I’m wondering if my feelings of “wrongness” will ever go away, which I can handle (since I’ve been handling it most of my life). Maybe this is just a part of me figuring out more about who I am. The imposter syndrome makes me wonder if I really have been faking competence my whole life and I’m simply losing the energy to keep up the con any longer. Ugh. I am going to have to figure this stuff out myself, as usual.

There is more to say, but I’m tired now. I’m sure it’s my age. The poppies…the poppies will put me to sleep. The poppies at this point are snack foods and maybe lunch, so off I go into the wild yonder that is my kitchen. I will take a big stick or a machete (which I will have to acquire somehow), just in case I need to clear a path.

I was incredibly frustrated a few days ago following the disastrous one-way video interview I submitted in search of a job. It was a terrible offering, and I wouldn’t have hired me based on that. The experience brought me down quite a bit, and I began feeling sure that I would probably never work again – nobody wants to hire aging progressive thinkers with multiple double-chins and who cusses like a sailor. We’re done, it’s over, there is no hope.

Somewhere at the bottom of that bowl of depression and self-pity, I sent out an esoteric flare, a call for help to the cosmos. Yeah, that might sound a bit odd, but that’s how I roll and I had to do SOMEthing. I was sinking fast and low and I know how that wave turns out. It turns inward and erodes what progress I have made and what resources I have accrued, and I can’t afford that right now (or really, at any time). Hence, the flare and call for assistance. HELP! I’m sinking here!

When I send out those flares, there is rarely an immediate response, and never disguised as a miraculous or something spontaneous that doesn’t require more action on my part. It takes a few days, at least in my time, but there’s always a response if I have my eyes and ears open. The response is rarely what I expect, or how I expect it, but it always comes.

The answer that presented itself was definitely not what I expected, but I am grateful nonetheless. I shared the interview experience, quite casually, in an AA meeting and people nodded knowingly. Later, however, someone in attendance contacted me and offered help in looking at my resume’ and discussing strategy for putting myself “out there” optimally. This is not someone I would never have thought had such expertise or would be in a position to help with writing a resume’ or job searching. Shows you what I know.

The traditional winter holidays are a little rough these past few years, and I don’t talk about it much so as not to be Debbie Downer with friends. Since my mother died, these winter holidays have taken on an entirely different complexion for me. I always spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with my mother in one way or another, either her visiting me or me visiting her. I had never been without my mother on a winter holiday since I was born, until she died in 2017. So…no what?

Well, a friend began inviting me to spend Thanksgiving with her and her family in 2017, which remains one of the kindest things I’ve ever had occur. The COVID lockdown has interrupted that, but her door is still open. That has meant the world to me. When it seems as though everyone else has a family to be with on that day, her table is big enough for one more.

This morning, I attended an online session led by a NY minister that I know. She’s actually from South Carolina, and I met her doing work in the UU district that once included NC and SC, and she has remained someone I follow. She hosts a session from her NY congregation called “Rising Strong”, and it’s about lots of things we’re encountering in the strange world of today. This morning it was about joy.

Her remarks about joy were exactly what I needed, about how joy and happiness are not the same thing, just as grief and sorrow are not equivalent. I recalled that when I have experienced happy feelings, they are very good and powerful and usually reaction to something that has pleased me. When the Saints win a football game, that usually causes me to feel happiness. Eating a good meal with friends, having good conversation, listening to good music causes me to react with happiness.

Joy is more a full-bodied experience for me, however. When I had “the talk” with my mother on her literal death bed, I experienced a lightening of my spirit and a release of long-held emotions of sorrow and regret, and when I recall that hospice room and her bedside I experience that same embodiment of release again. It’s not something I have to recall in my thought, it’s something I re-experience in my body. That’s the difference.

The session earlier was exactly what I needed for today, and that gave me joy. I was happy and glad that I had chosen to attend, but I experienced joy from the release of feeling heavy and stuck. I didn’t just feel happy, I was joyful.

I suppose being joyful in the wake of feeling burdened and grieving is so important because it signifies there is hope for continued better times. When I felt that release of spiritual baggage at my mother’s bedside, I had gained hope that life would go on, that I was not stuck at that place on the journey. When I have happiness, I don’ t have that clarity, and the feelings of sorrow and unhappiness eventually return.

It may be that more joy edges out more grief and sorrow. I had sorrow that I lost my job, that my mother died, that my last dog had to be euthanized. The grief was living in m y body, however, and that just fed the sorrow. I did not feel as though anything would be really be alright ever again. I stopped crying over those incidents fairly quickly after a few weeks, but I had no hope that I would soon be “recovered”.

When I am grieving, I am waiting for release, waiting for something I cannot even visualize, waiting for relief. I do not feel as though everything is going to be OK, I do not feel as though I will ever be the same, I do not feel as though I will ever have happiness, much less joy. Sorrow appears to pass, but grief seems to pull up a chair and put its feet up. It gets very comfortable, and hunkers down for the long haul.

If I’m not open to the unexpected, to what might interrupt the grief train, I’m going to be stuck there. It’s not a good place to be, there’s no light and the darkness shades everything. It’s hard to shine your light when there’s a shroud over the bulb.

Sometimes I have to consciously remember to be hopeful, but sometimes I am treated to reminders I didn’t expect. Those unexpected nudges can make the difference between making a permanent solution for a temporary problem, between washing away my own footsteps in the sand. I need to see those so that I remember where I came from, and that I didn’t start here.

There’s a wild fire not far from where I live today, on the mountain I can see from from here. It’s an iconic mountain, and the only one within at least 100 miles that can be seen with average eyesight in this area. It cannot be seen at night, but I know it’s there. It has an energy of its own, and thinking of a fire there makes me sad. The fire is close enough to bring some haze to our skies, so the air quality isn’t great. But, it is what it is and I just hope there’s no loss of life (human or animal).

Off to rewrite my resume’, or at leas rewrite the draft of the draft of the draft of the first draft. I hate rewriting things. I always think of more things to say then reverse my thought process and become convinced that I need fewer things to say. It will be OK. What’s for me is for me, but I just have to do the legwork. Unfortunately, I just want to take a nap.

Never confuse a position with the power – Woodrow Wilson had the position, but Ida B. Wells had the power. Lyndon B. Johnson had a position, but Martin Luther King, Jr. had the power.

Those are words spoken by a preacher in the PBS documentary “The Black Church”.

In these times, we have to admit the President of the United States (whoever that is at any given moment) has the position, but we the people have the power. To that end, the former guy had the position, but we had the power. That’s complicated because collectively we have no one else to blame for the state of affairs in which we find ourselves.

The current President of the United States has the position, but he does not have the power that many claim. He does not have the power to decree the price of gasoline, for example, but many blame him for the high price of gas today. He can’t do that, but the oil companies and oil lobby interests can. The machinations of various lobbying interests who interact with the OPEC leaders can do that. The President cannot.

Once again, I must consider the fact that power is a many splendored thing, to use an old phrase. We confuse power with abandon, we confuse power with strength, we confuse power with force. If money is power, it is only because we have made that agreement. Ultimately, money is an indiscriminate grouping of fibers and metallic tokens that means nothing in the natural world. It is a human construct, like time and like racism.

This issue comes to mind today only because yesterday I got an email response from the company with which I did the one-way interview. My initial response was to be a little dejected, but I quickly realized these people did not have any kind of personal relationship with me so I need not accept this as a rejection or a statement of my inadequacy. The only reason I might have to feel badly about this is because I have chosen to do that. They have a position as a hiring entity, but I have the power. I have the power to give up or keep going, the power to refuse some nameless and faceless entity the ability to dictate my opinion of myself.

I know this. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, what my brain knows is not the same thing as what my spirit knows or even what my heart knows. The brain may have the position, but does it have the power? Does my spirit have the power? Does my heart have the power? I suppose I must accept that brain, spirit, heart are interrelated and it is that triumvirate that ultimately has the power. There’s a catch, though – the power is expressed only when all facets are in balance and in right relation.

Out of balance, I will lean to one side or another, I will tilt and quiver and ultimately lose necessary perspective. That’s where I find myself right now, far off balance. I am not sure whether a remedy for that involves only reminding myself that I know who I am and practicing right thinking and right action. I forget, and forget often but I’m hoping that is not a fatal flaw.

Today is quiet, and that is not a bad thing. I applied for two positions online, which was counterintuitive for me because I want to give up. I want to wallow in a deep well of self-pity, but I chose to do something else, felt compelled to do something else. Hopefully, that will continue because I’m tired of being in combat with my Self.

Note to Self: lay down your arms, do the next right thing, rinse and repeat.

In my first solo apartment, I was all excited that it was getting close to Christmas. I had a new job that year, and by December I was in my groove and having a great time. The last work day before the Christmas holiday, it snowed! That’s a big deal in New Orleans, where it never snows. Homeless people were marching confusedly down the streets of the Business District, wondering how semi-tropical weather could have deteriorated so tragically. Streetcars and their passengers were stranded on ice-covered tracks as people suddenly recalled the lumbering rail cars are not capable of taking alternate routes.

The office party was cut short and we all took home tons of food (thank goodness I wasn’t drinking any longer or they would still be searching the ditches for me). It was hell getting home, and it took me over 90 minutes to travel less than 6 miles – nobody knows how to drive in the snow there so it was an adventure. Many people in front wheel drive vehicles were stunned to find they could only drive at oblique angles to the curb. Most drivers fought the wheel as though it was a sparring companion, and there were multiple accidents. I waited in traffic next to a car that had skidded into a tree on the side of the road, and the heavily bundled driver was gesturing frantically at the closed window. A swarthily bundled figure had made its way to the window, and was knocking gently. I rolled down my passenger window to see if they needed help, and heard this hilarious dialogue snippet, muffled of course:

Female driver: “I need the police! I need the police! Don’t rob me! Somebody call the police – anybody – please call the police!!!”

Swarthily bundled figure: “Lady I AM the police! I’m trying to help you, so stop screaming!”

Yeah, that’s New Orleans. I don’t know what happened between those folks, but I inched forward and was soon close to home. I managed to stop off at a grocery store because I figured once I got home, I wasn’t going anywhere for a while. I had the bright idea to roast pecans in the oven, so I bought fresh pecans and cinnamon and honey butter and I was so excited I couldn’t stand it.

Shortly after I got home and had tended to the dog, also excited beyond reason, I decided to follow through on my plan for roasted pecans, so I turned on the oven and laid out the nuts with the fixin’s in a roasting pan. The oven was preheated so I stuck the pan in, and so far so good. I went into the bedroom to see what was on the television and watch the snow fall, and…life was good. I heard the dog carrying on in the living room but paid her no mind – she barked at everything.

After about an 30 minutes of her barking, I decided to go and shut her up. As I walked toward the other room, I smelled the unmistakable acrid scent of something burning, the burning of something vaguely woodsy. To my horror I saw flames filling the viewing window of the oven, and astutely deduced the oven was on fire. I had forgotten the pan full of nuts and they had roasted and then singed and finally burned beyond resemblance to a crisp and into black ash. Amazingly, the aluminum pan itself was aflame.

I stared transfixed for at least a minute, because I didn’t quite know what to do. I couldn’t get close to the oven, because of course it was on fire. It was an electric oven, and I had the miraculously bright idea to pull the circuit breaker and shut off everything, including the heat. The dog stared at me, and I stared at her. I realized she had been very close to the front door, probably trying to escape the pending inferno. I could feel her sending me a psychic message that said, “Dumb ass. I tried to tell you.”

The flames eventually died down in the oven, and the smell eventually faded. I never tried to have chestnuts or any other nuts roasting on an open or a closed fire ever again, and as of when I moved out of that apartment the oven door gasket was pretty floppy and dysfunctional. I was never much of a cook so I didn’t miss it too much. Thoughts of any kind of nut roasting on either open or enclosed fire have never crossed my mind again, although I do still love pecans. A lot.

I recalled that story for a couple of reasons, one being a photo sent by a friend showing their outdoor roasting activities. The nut roasting memories remind me that I am fascinated by the fact that nuts are actually fruits. I usually think of fruits as juicy and sweet or sour foods with encased by a rind or skin and containing one or more seeds. Modern horticulture has been able to engineer seedless fruits, but that’s another story. I always understood fruit as something not akin to nuts, but as they say, you can’t judge a book by its cover.

People are like that. They all contain some kind of seed deep within, one that contains the essence of their being and enables procreation. There are no absolutes, the seed is what it is. Every once in a while, the seed becomes damaged by a breach in the protective covering, courtesy of invasion by some foreign organism. In the case of fruits with high sugar content, the seed is generally the least edible part of the form. In the case of the nut, however, the most edible part is the seed or meat contained within the shell. Same result, different methodology.

There are fruits and nuts that are visually enticing, pleasantly odiferous, attractive. Others, not so much. There’s even a tropical fruit with the moniker “ugly fruit”. Sometimes, the most attractive and pleasant-smelling fruit is poisonous. Cashew nuts are poisonous for dogs, as are grapes. There’s no rhyme or reason to which fruit is poisonous and which is nutritious or merely delicious. People are like that, too.

One cannot judge another person by their physical attributes, whether aesthetic beauty or skin color, ableness, intellect, or any other attribute. Once more, there are no absolutes. I’ve known for a very long time that some people do not resemble my image of evil people, or people who might purposely seek to harm others. They look like anybody else, but they will lie and cheat and misrepresent themselves to better achieve their goals. For example, one of the more notorious murderers often volunteered as a clown for children’s parties and hospital pediatric wards, but he was a heinous killer who showed no mercy to his victims. He easily won the trust of others, and after he was arrested may people expressed shock that such an affable fellow could be a serial killer.

I am not a good judge of character at times. People can pull the wool over my eyes rather easily, only to betray me in the final scene. For that reason, I no longer trust myself to choose wisely. I don’t belabor that point, but accept it as just the way it is. In all honesty, if someone intentionally seeks me out socially, I immediately assume there is something drastically amiss in their character and/or mental health. I’ve known for quite a while that I attract narcissists like flies on freshly dropped dung, so if somebody is trailing me they probably fit that description. Realizing that, I’ll be the one running in the opposite direction.

As I am looking for jobs these days, I still wonder what people see when they see me. I had the unfortunate opportunity to do a “one-way” interview for a job, and I had the chance to see what I look like in a video interaction. I was resoundingly shocked at what I saw – eyes darting form side to side, nonsensical responses, bearing a close resemblance to a cat on a hot tin roof. I wouldn’t have hired me based on that; I looked as though I was lying.

I think I can fix that presentation, but it saddens me to realize where that comes from. That cornered look is the look of the imposter, the look of someone who is waiting for the other shoe to drop, for people to find out that I AM lying about what I can do and who I am. That really sucks.

There are no lies being told, there is no pretense, there is no exaggeration of who I am or what I can do. If anything, I underestimate what I can do. But somewhere inside me there’s a gremlin that has been fed after midnight and is trying to wreck everything that is worthwhile about me. That critter has got to go, but I feel as though it’s too late. I will keep at it, but there’s a huge part of me that figures I will run out of time before I resolve this issue. That doesn’t seem fair. Bleh.

Today is the day after the commemoration of the traditional United States harvest feast we know as Thanksgiving. A great many people are making a strong effort to educate others on the mythology of the day; there were no happy Pilgrims and Native Americans sharing a peaceful meal and smoking peace pipes. Colonization was brutal and there was nothing peaceful about it. It’s still that way, and the United States in particular is trying to extend that legacy intergalactically – the first thing we did when landing on the Moon and on Mars was to plant our flag. I am sure there was someone somewhere muttering “I claim this land for God and the Queen”. If at first you don’t succeed try, try, try again.

So, I will try, try, try again. I don’t know exactly why, because there is so much about the effort that is exhausting. There is so much about the effort that begs why and even more that beg why not. I am the main character in the tale told by an idiot and signifying nothing, and so it goes.

I posted this on Facebook a year ago today, and much of it is still quite true. The past is the present is the past is the future. We can change the present, and that will change the future, but we must take good care in doing that. We have the future in our hands right now, right this moment, and we cannot afford to be careless. It takes only a second to flick a finger on the trigger of a gun and end life, yours and possibly someone else’s. It takes only a moment to dim the light of your spirit with the simple impulse of a muscle – a finger, or even a tongue that sends words out into the universe like projectiles of that can never be taken back. In either case, some bit of a spirit dies, the part that connects us to our Source. Without that connection, we die or at least cease to become who we are. As long as there is a choice, there is a chance to live. The point of life is to live.

let’s see. what’s on my mind. i truly have no idea. get it – no idea? ok, whatever.i do not have so many thoughts on my mind as feelings. the pervasive feeling of not knowing whether to laugh like a hysterical fool or cry like a child in the dark over the never-ending stream of public commentary diarrhea. we don’t know, and they don’t either, but we are desperately looking to the heavens (or maybe even into the underworld) for clues. look! he played golf while an international congress was meeting about the pandemic! we’re doomed – again…doubly doomed…o.m.g.! what does this mean? what is he thinking? what’s the other one thinking? we don’t know! somebody – quick – come up with a theory about what he might be thinking and what he might do.

this is like a horror movie, where you don’t know whether to shut your eyes or look the horror full on, since you knew (hoped) it would be scary and gory when you bought the ticket. you definitely want to get your money’s worth.

so. how big of a disaster will this be? can the election results actually be overturned? quick. someone research the most obscure legal and constitutional references you can find, and can’t explain, for how that might be done. or not. find experts, bonus points if they disagree. and that’s really the whole deal – we don’t know how any of this is going to look like, and the uncertainty is making us all nuts in our own special ways.

some of us are locked into the false pretense of power – we’ve got the right answer, and facts and film and credentials to prove that we know what we’re talking about. some of us are locked into oppositional defiance (who the fuck are you to say i shouldn’t fly off to see grandma, who i have not seen in 12 years, in an enclosed tin can with questionable electronics and people who can’t tell me where their hands have been in the past 72 hours? and no, i ain’t wearin’ no damned mask because this is America and i know my RIGHTS!).

some of us are resigned to the reality that time is going to pass, on its own schedule, no matter what response we make. we are just determined not to be deprived of any further convenience, comfort, so we distract ourselves by any means necessary. look. SQUIRREL! no, not a squirrel, wtf is that??? well, it’s shoe polish running down Giuliani’s face during a press conference on … what exactly? well, let’s discuss what exactly that was about…experts disagree. *head desk*in the meantime, back in the real world.

thousands of people are dying from COVID-19. every. day. millions are out of work. parents are wrestling with the conflicting information about whether or not it’s safe to entrust their children to an in-person school experience, no matter how big they are.

sending your 5-year-old brings up the same issue as sending your 18-year-old to college, although your 18-year-old may engage in more risk-prone behaviors than your 5-year-old. but that’s another story. parents of legal minor children also have to deal with the reality, heretofore invisible to many, that school = child care during working hours, so virtual learning is another kink in the plans for gainful employment. when you can’t work, you can’t participate in retail economy (for food or otherwise), which puts more folks out of work, and depending on unemployment or stimulus assistance (or lack thereof) puts the economy under more stress, which is a problem unless you’re at the executive level of retail corporations or elected government.

is your brain exploding yet? many of ours are, begging … somebody please bring us back to a place before all this (pick a crisis) came up and forced us to think about this inequity stuff. please bring us back to a time when knowing there was inequity was more like an itch on the scalp than a migraine headache that can’t be relieved by even prescription medication, or a hammer, or chanting “personal responsibility” like a mantra. when handing a $1 to someone on the corner assured us that we had done something, at least for the moment.

please don’t make us think about how what we have, or don’t have, might be connected to that person on the corner has or doesn’t have, and how that is not necessarily associated with the morality or character of either us or them but could the reason that one of us has a $1 and the other doesn’t. not just today, but every day. and please, please bring us back to a time when confidence in our decision making was mostly unquestionable, and we didn’t have to suspect that everyone – even our own kin – was lying to us, trying to cheat us, trying to get more than their fair share. even if we did, we could just grab brewski at the local watering hole or some burgers at the pub. when we didn’t have to fear that our migraine was actually a brain aneurysm that can blow at any time.

our leaders, our media, our trusted heroes, even some of our churches have all come under suspicion for most of us. these things are the bedrock of our lives. this is our culture. things that let us feel that we are walking on solid ground, like we know what’s going on and that god willin’ and the creek don’t rise, it’s gonna keep going on pretty much as we expect. but we don’t have that assurance right now, and it’s scaring us into some kind of a feral state, like wild dogs that have never known love or where their next meal is coming from.

to our horror, we find out there’s been an earthquake…whether we felt it directly or not. the ground shook, stuff fell off the shelves, and things do not feel solid beneath our feet. it’s been going on for a while, although the tremors were slight at the start. it was a full-fledged shifting of terra firma. many bodies are on the streets, in the halls of justice and government and the economy – marching, trudging/rolling to unknown destinations, moving to and fro, in a flurry, pacing (metaphorically or otherwise), standing or sitting in place.

there are many quakes, some larger than others – this is more or less metaphorical, but also happens in the physical geology or our planet, where clusters of quakes are documented, shifting the order of centuries- and millenia-old strata, ordering of elements, resources. and there are after-shocks, there is demolition, solid and sometimes ancient human-made structures are in pieces, or tottering. landmarks disappear. some things are damaged beyond repair and have to be eradicated, for continued safety.

the land appears foreign to us in an instant, and is realistically unsafe to house us for now. traditional structures that have encased and often protected us, for good and not so good, are fragile and flimsy if not entirely fallen. some of us live no longer, and the remainder find that we must cling to each other and depend … on each other. well, fuck. that’s a problem.

we’ve been taught for some time now to distrust each other, separate from each other, compete with each other, hate each other. fight against each other. protect only our own resources. forget that all of the resources are connected. forget there’s actually enough resources for all of us, as long as they are distributed equitably. we’ve become accustomed to taking care of only ourselves, and our kind, and our…stuff. we seek to ensure only our own comfort and maximum benefit. extra points if you can do that at a higher level than everyone else. he who dies with the most toys wins. protecting and serving has come to apply only to some temporary man-made contrivances of convenience and status.

we believe the Land has been put here for only individual human benefit and comfort. perhaps that is why the Earth quakes and attempts to shake off the false lines humans have drawn between people and populations and resources.

this is the time. this is the Now. and this is all we’ve got. it may not be the only time, but it is the only Now. we can’t bring back what has been, we can’t bring on the future, without dealing with Now. we have to do the best we can to move from one moment to the next in this new order of things, and not concentrate on restoring the old order. it got us here, but its time has passed. some things will necessarily be preserved – we’ll still inhale and exhale. we’ll still drink water, we’ll still eat food. we’ll still have our faith, and our foibles, and we’ll still (of course) have our brains to form opinions and make judgements about what has happened and what’s happening now.

what separates us from other life forms, though, is that we can dream. we can still dream of a future where things are safe again for all of us, where things are better for us, where there is more of what we want and less of what we don’t. we can still dream, and we can still love. that is what is never destroyed in the human condition, never shifted out of existence, never truly in demand ( perhaps in manifestation, but not truly).

we almost can’t help ourselves. we love. and we dream. and that is who we are. not just some of us, but all of us. i hope we can be child-like enough to realize that some of us color the sun purple and the grass red or yellow, and some of us color the moon orange and horsies blue, and the sky is orange and black or a rainbow for some of us. and it’s all good. every bit of it. it’s ALL good.

What more can I do, what else is there to say? Nothing seems to matter much anyway.

I used to write really bad poetry on bar napkins, on a barstool, at the bar. It made no sense to do that, wanting to attract attention but dramatically rejecting it when it came. At least they noticed me, I thought. There was a need to be superlative, the bestest mostest weirdest ugliest. I achieved that status and more, because I was the most undesirable, the one who always went home alone when the lights came on.

What kind of crap is it that runs through my veins and turns day into night and night into an infinitely and incrementally darkening abyss? Scooby Do, where are you? I think I’m right her, but someone or something is sitting on me and blocking out the light. The nonsense is winning and has sense running for the hills. The hills are not alive with the sound of music, unless you count the gators.

Nonsense. I have written nonsense. I have no sense to emote today. It is the first day of the rest of my life or the last day of the beginning of my death. Sometimes there is no real difference between the two. I have always known that, and no amount of “Happiness is a choice” is going to change that. This is no time for platitudes.

On any given day, I can see clearly now (with or without the song) and understand there is nothing to see. There is the passage of time and that dull sound that signifies motion but progress is imperceptible. I cannot see that anything has changed at the moment it changes, but the cumulative effect generally lends itself to stark realization. At the moment of the Presidential inauguration of 2016, nothing actually changed. Four years later, everything had changed, all hinged on that moment in 2016.

That’s how the universe actually works, one moment that leverages the next and the next and so on and so on and son. Ad infinitum. We donm’t speek Latin any longer, but most of the language I speak today has its roots in Latin. We build things. We build things on top of other things and alongside other things and then we have new things. That’s how we do this world, minute by minute.

Deconstructing things isn’t terribly productive, but that often makes way for new things. We don’t really take anything away from deconstruction, or learn anything. If our construction fails, it usually self-destructs and we can learn from that if we pay attention, but deconstruction really only serves our egos. Like the old mama’s admonition of “I brought you into this world, and I can take you out of it.” And so we come back to the power. Who has power to build, who has power to destroy, who has power to make things happen?

Who indeed has that power? I contend that power is a relationship, because you cannot have power without having something else. Something else that has less power, or something else that has no power, or something else that yields. Sitting here all by myself power is irrelevant. It only becomes relevant when I have something to move against, or move with, in the quest for some achievement.

I do a disservice to the reality of power when I see it solely as a means to an end. Power is the manifestation of energy as directed toward a finite point of time and space. I am wondering if I should not see other humans as measures of energy rather than as measures of power. A political dictator is only as powerful as we allow them to be, although we forget that. Perhaps, however, the charismatic dictator has enough energy to attract complimentary energies and thus manifest enough power to achieve a goal.

Force is the fundamental result of an interaction between two objects, while power is an expression of energy consumed over time (work), of which force is an element. Force and power can both be described and measured, but a force is an actual physical phenomenon, and power in itself is not.

I suppose the point is that power is consumptive. Power consumes energy over time, and that is equivalent to work. If I have little energy, I can’t get much work done. If there’s a lot of work to be done, I’ll have to find more energy, either my own or from an external source. That’s what slavery was for. That’s what sweat shops are for. That’s what corporations are for. All of those systems serve to amplify the amount of energy available to do work, and work yields a product that can yield a net gain of some commodity. Welcome to capitalism.

When I do work, I have to account for how much force is required to overcome the inertia of things I need to move, or change. Once I’ve moved the object, I’ve consumed energy to do that, according to the force I’ve produced. Power is how much energy I’ve consumed over the time it takes to achieve the desired result. I might have that wrong, but that’s how I’m thinking about it right now. More research is called for, but it’s a work in progress.

I’ve got to muster up enough power to find a @$&! job. Sooner rather than later. It’s beginning to stress me out. OK, it’s stressed me out significantly already, so I’ve got to stop eating Golden Oreos and get my fat ass up and rolling in a coherent fashion. This has gotten redickuless. And yes, that is a word. A word of my own making. Creativity is mine.

I’ve been having a lot of trouble sleeping lately. It’s been going on a few months now, and the pattern has been that I fall asleep and wake up every three or four hours thereafter. Most nights I’m getting a total of around six hours. I used to be a solid eight to ten hour sleeper, so this has concerned me a bit since I feel tired all day.

A few nights ago, I became a little obsessed with the idea that my interrupted sleep was driving down my immune system and/or causing other negative health consequences, so I decided to take a few does of the over-the-counter ZZZZquil concoction. It seemed to work fairly well, and I went to sleep at a reasonable hour. I woke up once to go to the bathroom, but was able to go right back to sleep. I got a total of more than seven hours of sleep, and felt pretty well after the dog drug me out of bed that morning.

I have a relatively slow metabolism, so the after-effects of the sleepy stuff lingered into yesterday, and it’s been more than two days since I took the stuff. I had my 3rd COVID vaccine dose on the day I took it, so don’t know if that played into the prolonged effect, but I was dead to the world again last night. It was an eventful night of sleep, though.

I had the weirdest dream ever, one that seemed to last for days and one that made me feel as though I had run a marathon in my sleep. The dream included people, at least one who I recognized as an actual friend in real-life. I was talking to her and realized I had to go to the bathroom, and while I was telling her that I was going to do that, she suddenly morphed into another person. It was somewhat scary, and I remember in the dream that i felt my solar plexus turn upside down. The “new” person just kept talking as though nothing had happened, and when I came out of the bathroom she had disappeared. Hmmmmm.

After that, I was somehow in a shopping mall, and then an arena, and maybe a convention center. In all of those places, I had to do a lot of uphill hiking, and I’m not sure where I was going. I was surprised that I was able to complete each hike, uphill and all. That was really interesting. I was trying to get somewhere, but I didn’t realize where until almost the end.

When I was in the arena, I knew that I wanted to get down to floor level but I was up higher. There were a lot of people there. A party of folks sitting near me, who looked like maybe a family with kids, said they were going to switch seats so I could have their seats. I didn’t understand but they made me understand that if I took their seats I could tunnel underneath the entire bank of seats and get down to the floor that way. Once I understood what they meant, I realized I had to keep pushing out bricks in the wall that held up each row of seats in order to lower myself to the floor level. Very weird.

So, I did all that, and by that time I realized that I was trying to get to the Michigan Womens Music Festival (to which I have been in the 80s and 90s and which is now defunct). When I got to the floor, however, I still didn’t know how to get to where I wanted to go, so I told a staff person that I needed to get out of the arena but every door I tried wasn’t an exit. (???) The person asked me where I was trying to go, and I told him. He stared at me and said he thought that festival was shut down, but the path was still there. He pointed out to the left, so I headed that way.

When I got to the point the staff person had indicated, it was a dirt pathway, but I started walking. Uphill yet again, but not terribly steep. The foliage got thicker, and that was fine with me. The incline began to increase, and there were some boulders and rocks blocking the path. Because it was a dream, there was some man hiding in the bushes and talking on the phone. (You can’t make this shit up.) I kept going and conquered all of the obstacles and found myself on the dusty road again.

As I kept walking, I began to hear music. It was so welcome to my ears, and this WAS a music festival after all. I kept walking in the direction of the music, and then came to a clearing that seemed familiar. There were a bunch of people there, packing up their campers and trucks and cars, as though preparing to leave. They all just stared at me blankly, and they were not at all surprised that I was there.

I woke up shortly after that, feeling that if I fell asleep again I’d be at that point again and might continue the dream experience. The dog was more than certain that it was time to get up, so I did not attempt a reprise of the dreamscape. It was odd, to say the least.

Normally, I don’t remember my dreams with so much clarity. Normally I don’t remember my dreams at all. But this one I did, and felt that it was very near lucid. I was conscious of doing things and being intentional about the actions I was taking at various points, which is a notch above a simple dream. But who knows.

I wish the Michigan Womens Music Festival was still alive, though. It was a fabulous experience when I was there, and was the safest place I’ve ever been. In this day and age, I would no more dream of sleeping outdoors in the middle of rural woods than I would eating a live crawfish, but…it was Festival, and you could do that. It was 600 acres in the middle of nowhere and they had their own security. Feminist uptopia for a week in August.

Whatever that dream signified to me will come to me. It had layers of meaning and significance that have left me feeling a lot more in place than I have been lately. That’s really bizarre, but welcome. Maybe I need to go on a hike…out in the middle of nowhere…although i’ll need to pick out a safe spot. People iz crazy out thar.

“Curiouser and curiouser!” cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).”

I checked out a writing prompt and it directed me to reflect on history that I’ve been part of, or at least witnessed, and how it has impacted or changed me. I’m old enough to remember a few significant events in world history, and even more that don’t have quite so wide a circle of influence. Or is that even true?

When I was a kid, I remember the Moon landing. It was all over television, and I remember getting a vinyl record of the famous radio transmissions broadcast when the first steps on the Moon were taken. It amuses me no end to witness persistent rumbling that all of the NASA activity was falsified, and the entire thing was filmed on a movie sound stage. I can’t quite see how that could be, because people have loose lips and it would have taken a large number of people to pull off such a farce. The likelihood that none of them would talk or reveal a conspiracy seems very unlikely.

But I remember those moments, and I remember the mood of people around me changing after the astronauts had done the deed and returned to Earth. There was a bit of wonder, and even pride. Look what WE did! WE landed on the MOON! Never thought it was possible, but WE DID IT! I felt as though animosity was just a tiny bit less, tension a tiny bit less, and people suddenly had a common event to converse about, a positive and non-controversial event they could share.

On a lesser note, I remember when New Orleans got approval for an NFL franchise. People went absolutely wild, they were delighted and giddy, excited like Christmas morning. We all went through first training camp, first draft, first ticket sales. New Orleans has always had an incredible fan base, the most forgiving fans in the league. We all eagerly watched the first televised games, or proudly stormed the stadium (this was before the SuperDome). I remember one of the games I saw was between the Saints and the Detroit Lions, and the Saints lost 63-0. We were disappointed, but our excitement and pride was not diminished.

I’m not sure exactly how that works, and when victory becomes less an issue than shared experience. The Saints franchise has long been a less-than successful winning proposition, but that has never quelled the enthusiasm and loyalty of the fans. I have gone through more than half of my life with a losing NFL team, and losing alma mater (Tulane Green Wave), and it mattered not. The crime rate always went up just a hair following a Saints loss, but that only lasted as long as the hangovers. By Wednesday, things were back to normal and people were holding open doors for each other at churches all over town.

I wonder where that changes, where it becomes less good-natured and less about a game and becomes a matter of life and death. Where debate about the best player or the worst referee call becomes grounds for bodily harm. How does a difference of opinion like this result in homicide, or great bodily harm?

At somewhere near 8:30 a.m. on September 11, 2001 I was getting ready for work. There was no work-from-home option, so I was gulping down coffee and putting on my shoes in preparation for the short journey to my work site. Almost out of the corner of my eye I saw live television coverage about something I couldn’t quite make out. There was some energy behind it, somber voices were intoning, “This can’t be an accident, folks. A second plane has crashed into the World Trade Center, and this just can’t be an accident.”

I knew it was a big thing, and I bolted out of the apartment and got into my truck to proceed into the downtown area. Nothing seemed out of place, traffic was flowing normally, but the radio was tense. I immediately understood this was a moment in time beyond which nothing would be the same. It reminded me of the moments when the assassination of President Kennedy were announced, when the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. was announced. “This is a special report. President John F. Kennedy has been shot in Dallas.” “This is a special report. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. has been assassinated in Memphis.” This is a special report – life has changed.

I only vaguely remember when Kennedy was assassinated. I was only three years old, but I more remember the solemn mood of people around me. I remember the incessant news reports that interrupted regular programming. I remember my parents and neighbors talking in serious tones about things. I remember the mood of people around me, a mood that begged silence, and demanded stillness.

When Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed I remember the moment the broadcast television program was interrupted. I might be wrong, but I think it was “Gunsmoke” that my mother and I had been watching when the special report broke in. I heard the words, but I more distinctly remember my mother’s reaction. She was sitting up in bed, and I was curled up toward the bottom. She was reading something while the television droned, and when the announcement that King was dead had been spoken, she grabbed at her hair and went nearly stiff. A wail of dismay rushed out of her, and I had never heard that tone before. “AWWW! NO!”

Hearing my mother wail in this way frightened me just a little. I’d heard screaming and cussing and rage before, but not this kind of deep pain and emptiness. She immediately called someone, my grandmother or aunt perhaps, and I went back to coloring or whatever I was doing. I didn’t feel tremendously comfortable at that point, but was determined to stay out of the way. I guess my father was at work, but once he got home they conferred in dark, quiet tones at the kitchen table. I continued to work on my coloring book, but I was on alert and wasn’t sure what might happen next.

The point of these monumental moments in history isn’t so much about the event itself, but the reaction of the people impacted. That’s what ultimately memorializes things in your psyche, and that’s what makes the memory. When I’ve taken history classes, learning about Pompeii and the American Revolution was fascinating but I didn’t have that personal emotional response attached. I understood the significance of those events in the general scheme of world history, and how they contributed to my current reality, but I have only a mental place holder rather than an emotional one.

Because there is a difference between having a mental place holder vs. an emotional place holder, people are rarely moved by factual recounting of events. They become passionate about the emotional significance, and I suppose that’s why a disgruntled Saints fan might seriously contemplate homicide over a difference in opinion about game strategy. That probably holds true for the Popeye’s chicken sandwich as well since projecting the emotional response of a satisfying meal probably lights up the same areas of the brain.

Regardless, we’ve all been through some things. We all have feelings about such things, and how our reactions fit in with the reactions and emotions of others is like a serious game of Jenga. We fit together in bizarre ways, and it’s not for us to say how that works.

I’ve been participating in a social justice effort each Friday, courtesy of my UU State Action Network. A bunch of us gather via Zoom and take a few intentional actions toward increasing justice and equity in some way.

A week or so ago, we composed and submitted letters to the editor of our local newspapers about one of several topics including Medicaid expansion, educational system remediation, voter suppression, and so on. We had talking points, and suggestions for letter format, but were encouraged to make the letters personal.

I wrote a letter lobbying for Medicaid expansion in the state, and included a personal anecdote outlining my struggle to afford health care while unemployed. I didn’t spend very much time on it, and considered it a minimal effort. I had revised it a couple of times, but finally just hit the “submit” button on the publication’s website and called it a day.

To my shock, the letter was published a couple of days later. This publication doesn’t notify you if your submission is published, but a friend of mine just let me know about it in passing. I was unabashedly thrilled, and had a spontaneous goofy smile on my face that is only just now fading.

Having your thoughts recognized and witnessed by others does something for a person. When you dabble in writing endeavors, it’s a bigger deal than just making your point. It inexplicably validates the effort, the clarity of thought as well as the artistry. I didn’t consider this a particularly skillful expression, but someone else considered it decent enough to publish.

It’s such a small thing, not like having been published in the New York Times or anything, or paid for a commissioned work, but it’s a thing. There is gratification in having cared enough to impart one’s thoughts for an unknown audience, followed through on making those musing available, and having an impartial judge consider it worthy to transmit. Such a small thing.

A multiplicity of small things will change the energy of our shared existence, and thereby change the world. We underestimate the value of such contributions, and often ignore the less than grandiose. I am infernally guilty of that, frequently deciding that imperfection makes a contribution entirely useless. The letter to the editor that I submitted was tremendously imperfect, but it expressed thoughts I wanted to share so the intent was perfect.

To have someone else affirm that what you feel and what you think is not bullshit is a big deal, even if it’s whispered. A great many monumental things start with a whisper, as Tracy Chapman says in one of her songs…”Don’t you know we’re talking ’bout a revolution, and it sounds…like a whisper?”

Revolutions are sometimes about millions of people and millions of dollars, but they start with one person deciding that something needs to change. That decision is about one person, who finds commonality with another, then another, and another until a gargantuan web of common sentiment is woven. That is how communities of common interest are formed, whether the common interest is voter empowerment or soccer.

It starts with the desire, the passion that will make sympathetic vibrations shake the foundation of receives the focus. We can do this, but perhaps we don’t believe in ourselves. Perhaps we have become accustomed to admitting defeat before we’ve even begun to fight. That’s how it works in my little corner of the Universe, when I stop trying because, “Oh, well. It doesn’t matter how many times you try you’re too small to really make a difference. Just accept that here you are and here you are going to stay.”

That’s the definition of stuck, and I don’t want to be stuck any longer. I don’t believe I have to be stuck, don’t believe there’s nothing I can do. Of course, I must admit, that I have no idea what exactly I can do to change my circumstances or anything I care about, but I have to believe that I’ll figure that out, that something will come to me.

I frequently proclaimed that a storm was coming, so be prepared to run. Run, hide, stay low and wait until the authorities sound the all-clear. Maybe I’m the authority, at least of my own situation. I get to say when it’s all-clear and I get to say whether I’ll run. Maybe running away doesn’t quite fill the bill these days. Some of us are going to have to run toward the disaster, run into the wind, run into the burning building.

We know how to survive. Our survival efforts may not always be successful, but we know how to do that. I have said many times in recent years that I no longer want to survive. I want to live. There is a difference between surviving and living, and I am opting for the latter.

It will be OK. And no, I don’t know what OK looks like, but that may be a good thing. If I knew what OK looked like, it would probably be the recycled image of someone else’s vision and not my own. I have the duty to create what OK looks like for me, and I want to get in the game.