[Originally posted 10 March 2011]
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ot feeling well, here. I don’t know why; there’s probably some
good reason for it. Blame it on old age, maybe—my sixtieth birthday is fast
approaching, but I don’t really think that’s it. The weather is uncertain and
changeable, alternately threatening and inviting, and that could be darkening
my emotional landscape too, but again, I don’t really think that’s it. Life
here is imploding fast as well; the foreclosure grinds on, with no end in
sight, taking its emotional toll, my one brother is rapidly approaching the end
of his financial rope, and taken as a whole things continue rapidly to
deteriorate. This isn’t even van-by-the-river time; my van’s in the shop, and
everything looks chancy and uncertain.
Which makes it hard to concentrate on anything. I spent some
time today organizing books, mainly getting stray volumes back on the shelves
where they belong, which has something of the deck-chairs-on-the-Titanic feel
to it, truth to tell. The thing is, nothing is that urgent, probably.
Resolution on the house is likely to be months away, as I understand it, and my
family is generally resourceful; even if we crash and burn, we’ll probably do
it with a certain degree of dignity. And I’ve had other birthdays. I’ve never
had a sixtieth before, but then, I never had a twenty-seventh, or a
forty-second, until I actually had one. Honestly, I never really thought I’d
get past thirty-three.
And so springtide cometh, where the days are more nearly equal
to the nights than not, and flowers start blooming and the grass becomes ragged
and in need of a mowing. A chancy, uncertain time of year at best. Storm clouds
are as likely as sunshine, and sometimes both come at once. The news abroad
fits with the season—gloomy and indecisive. I read how some Army commander
found fifty thousand dollars and change to host a third-class hillbilly revival
on government facilities with his full endorsement, but could only spare a tiny
venue and no financial wherewithal to bring Richard Dawkins and an all-star
lineup to the same base. I can’t say I’m disappointed; I expected no less from
the customarily two-faced US military. And chaos reigns in Wisconsin, where a
venal governor is determined to cut the pay for public employees, forbid future
union negotiations over work conditions and benefits, apparently in order to
pay off his financial backers. (My hope is that this will prove a pyrrhic
victory, as the American people wake from their long slumber to fight back
against the mad tea-partiers and other business-as-usual crazies—but the American
people seem to be perfectly capable of long-time survival despite having their
heads firmly in the sand. Or rather up their collective rectums.) Elsewhere
Alan Abel wannabe James O’Keefe is promoting is latest hoax, this time aimed at
PBS, though why anybody is still paying him any attention beats me. How many
times are the mainstream media (Fox in particular) going to cash this guy’s bad
checks? Once bitten and all that, right? Middle-East meltdown goes on.
Afghanistan deteriorates. Gaddafi threatens to jump ship (jump, baby, jump!).
Some guy in Portland calls 911 to report himself as a house-breaker—seems the
owners have returned and he’s afraid they might be armed. None of it makes much
sense—but then that’s what one would expect in this chaotic and uncertain
universe.
Classic mindscum—I started with nothing in particular to say,
and I ended up nowhere in particular. Pile up enough words together and sense
emerges—sometimes. I don’t think this was one of them. Put it down to the
weather. Maybe I’ll feel better in a day or two.
[Updates: the
foreclosure did grind on for several more years, my van never did come out of
the shop, chaos still reigns in Wisconsin, James O’Keefe is still peddling his
idiotic hoaxes, the mad tea-partiers are still at work accelerating America’s
downfall, Gaddafi is gone but not forgotten, and the American people are still
asleep at the switch as the train speeds towards its rendezvous with oblivion.]
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