'Cause we live in a timeWhen meaning falls in splinters from our lives ...
— Robert Lawrence Welch, Sentimental Lady (Fleetwood Mac, Bare Trees, 1972)
November 15
I am still missing Kathleen. As I have mentioned before, I could have used her knowledge of history to help me shore up some of my inklings about the long trajectory of a downfall we are on.
I try to not be entirely negative. I hope, of course, that I will be wrong. I am somewhat still amazed at how fast The Orangeshitgibbon is putting his vengeance and stupidity into place. And more dismayed at watching Biden lean into his persona as a stalwart of democracy rather than lifting a single finger to try to save some of it.
I am not saying some remarkably good things did not happen under Biden. But he has always creeped me out. His aviator glasses always made me think he was living in the 1930s or 1940s, imagining himself as some hero aviator. A new version of John Wayne machismo. I found his speeches to be strident in a way that seemed he was masking insecurity. His delusions of self-worth, and inability to see what was going on and to act on it WHEN IT WOULD HAVE MADE A DIFFERENCE, say two years ago, stagger me. Sad that he won't live long enough to realize his hubris had a big hand in our current political situation.
Not that it is all his fault.
November 22
Carl, my younger brother, was born 66 years ago. He died just before his 54th birthday. I still miss him, of course. As time and some intelligence/information has passed and grown, I better understand his neurodivergence, which, truthfully was evident from his childhood. I used to get so mad at him and his legendary inattention, but now I know it was undiagnosed ADD. I know that ADD was known when he was a child, but my parents were unlikely truly aware of it.
I probably had a certain amount of it as well, but I was pretty good at coping with it in school and such. I do recall an inability to study and meet deadlines. I took a journalism class on writing reviews and would have gotten the highest grade in the seminar had I not handed in all my papers a day late. And I very nearly flunked French because I read Barbara Pym novels instead of studying, even thought I knew studying was imperative. I wasn't very good at French until I got to the third level when it was all review. I have no memory whatsoever of French II, although I can remember both my Level I and Level III professors.
My blog silence has been due to tearing apart my cupboards to clean and downsize. The job is still not complete, although my dear friend Debee came down to help me organize for several days. We accomplished quite a bit in the way of organizing my terrible patio mess, but everything is left in various stages of incompletion. Hopefully, I can finish organizing the kitchen and dining room today. (N.B. Did not happen.)
I let myself sleep in today. As is the case, time speeds up on the days that I sleep in, so that now it is nearly noon. Janet needs awakening and managing, which is never a task I look forward to.
I have mostly been ignoring the news for what remains of my mental health. Things filter through, and I do look at the news here and there for a few minutes. I have had terrible recurrent apthous stomatitis (canker sores) which, in my case, are triggered by stress. Of which I have a lot. This condition has never been taken very seriously but it seems to be getting worse as I get older. Or maybe it is just the combination of the life stress of dealing with my mother and my own deteriorating future prospects, combined with the many faces of despair, distress, hopelessness, and powerlessness of this current political conditions in this country.
The cleaning and purging stresses me, too, although I know it is critically important work to do. Looking at how many things I have acquired and how much there is and how much there still is to go through, got me so stressed this week that I had to take something for my anxiety. I am motivated with the thought that this work is moving me closer to getting out of here (for which there is both delight and terror).
Janet woke herself up, so I need to get out of being on bed, and find some focus to get on with the day.
November 23
Yesterday ended up in the "pretty lost" category. I was not able to do much of anything. Patty dropped by and we had a nice chat. I took a two hour nap, then woke up for a couple of hours, and then went to bed at 8:15 only to wake up twelve hours later. Janet had to put herself to bed, which she seemed to do. I could not keep open my eyes.
And on top of the political horrors abounding, it is the peak of Merchandising Season. The extreme frenzy of blinking lights, themed-everything, more stress and expectation, and worst of all, Christmas music all the time everywhere. Participating in any of this seems a betrayal of all my values and that which I esteem. Hmm ... sounds like the realities of the election have washed over to other domains ...
I am not anywhere near the first to observe or comment on it, but the consumer/merchandising pitch in this country is sensory overload. When, during the course of the year, is there NOT some holiday to build expectation for? The only time I can see some respite is from Easter to Memorial Day. So far, Easter is relatively low-key. I haven't seen any nine-foot lawn rabbits blasting Here Comes Peter Cottontail and Easter Parade in between chomping on carrots and expelling Easter eggs.
AUTUMN
Again the wind
flakes gold-leaf from the trees
and the painting darkens—
as if a thousand penitents
kissed an icon
till it thinned back to bare wood,
without diminishment.
—Jane Hirschfield,The Paris Review, Issue no. 109 (Winter 1988)