Joy scrolling

I've been down with a cold, shuffling around the house coughing, blowing my nose, watching movies, with no energy for much else.  The past couple of nights, to entertain myself, I discovered what I call joy scrolling, watching all sorts of non-political video shorts and having a great time with them.  I mean, how satisfying it is to watch bullies, karens, and porch pirates get their just desserts or to see cops crack up as they are being scolded by sassy old ladies.  

There are, of course, a lot of animal videos: dogs protecting their human babies from falling bookcases, fires, swimming pools, and ledges; both dogs and cats fighting off wild animals (it's exciting to watch a domestic cat scare off a bear); children reacting to being given a puppy; cats reacting to a fright.  It surprised me how many sequences there are of wild animals (panthers, bears, foxes, deer, even a bald eagle) approaching a human to ask for help for an injured mate or young one.  Naturally those always end up with a bond developing between the animal and its human. 

Some of my favorites have been acts of kindness from stranger to stranger.  It's so heartwarming to see people reach out to one another.  These remind me never to pass up a chance to reach out a hand to someone who clearly needs one.  Speaking of which, apparently there is a signal a woman can make while walking in public if she is being controlled or trafficked by a man: gently reach out and swipe the hand or thigh of a passing stranger, then put that free hand (the other usually gripped by the man) behind the back and curl/uncurl/curl the fingers as though in greeting.  If ever you see that, help her.

I understand that some of the videos are setups, and in this time of realistic AI images one can't always trust what one is shown.  For example, there is a gripping video of 3 buffaloes of some kind (not American bison) running alongside a big rig, bumping into it as though to signal it to stop.  The truck does finally stop before crossing a bridge, and a moment later the bridge blows up.  Pretty cool until I stopped to think: Who is taking that video and where are they that they have such a vantage point?  That one is likely AI generated, but still fun to watch.

A couple of my favorites: 

A cop's bodycam revealing him hassling a quiet older Black man in a laundromat, insisting the man show what he is holding in a bag.  The man finally stands up and pulls out a judge's robe.  Boy oh boy, did that cop's tone of voice change immediately to one of contrition.  I just hope he remembers that moment and reassesses his prejudices.

And the most dramatic of all: A young man, captured by a street security camera, walking along a sidewalk when he sees a baby falling from a 5 story balcony.  He somehow manages to catch the baby.  Hero, right?  Well, the story doesn't end there.  The mother of the baby takes him to court for what she calls "reckless rescue"!  Sues him for $500,000.  Fortunately, the judge reprimands the mother harshly, dismisses the case, and orders her to issue a formal apology and pay the young man a hefty sum. 

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zaORbAbwar0

It's true the baby suffered broken bones from the impact of the fall.  Perhaps the mother is panicked because if she doesn't have someone to blame, she is going to be faced with huge medical bills.  Perhaps, in her mind, it would have been better (ie. cheaper) for the baby to die rather to have to go through surgeries and rehabilitation.  Perhaps, who knows, she didn't want the baby and actually let it fall, and now instead of being freed is stuck with a broken baby.  That, we'll never know.

I realize I need to stop this late night scrolling because it usually keep me up until 3am or so, and then I still wake up at my usual 5:30 or 6.  My days of sleeping in appear to be behind me.  But I have fully enjoyed these nights of entertaining myself with things going on in the world that I otherwise have no access to.  So, fatigued?  Yes.  Regretful?  Absolutely not.

Why the rallies?

 While I was on a vacation with a group of girlfriends, three of us went to a No Kings gathering.  It was the weekend when thousands of similar rallies, marches, and gatherings were happening around the country and the world.  The one I went to in Henderson, NV was very well attended, and also well managed.  Lots of clever signs, lots of supportive honking from passing cars (only one person flipped us the bird and one gave us a thumbs down from his Tesla tank), a peaceful crowd, and a beautiful day.  It felt really good to be there to lend my voice and presence.

After that weekend of protests, my brother posed the question: Why do we do it?  These gatherings most likely won't change anyone's mind.  I have thought a lot about that question since then.  And here is what I've come up with:

For one thing, we don't actually know if anyone's mind is changed or not.  Like teachers, we often don't get to know if we've had any effect on someone whose orbit intersected ours.

For another thing, I believe we participate as a way of saying "I know that what is happening is wrong and I'm not afraid to stand up publicly and say so."  It's a way of demonstrating and living our own values.  

And of course there is also the solidarity factor, the sense of community these gatherings inspire during a divisive time when so many of us are discouraged and disturbed.  It's good to know that other people, a lot of other people, are in agreement.  It can help keep depression at bay; very important since depression leads to despair and inaction, which are a win for the other side.

I don't think these acts of protests are necessarily about changing anyone's mind.  Whatever we Democrats/liberals/lefties have been doing or say has clearly been unsuccessful, since this toxic narcissist was elected a second time.  I think it is Trump himself who will ultimately change the minds of the people who support him: the farmers who voted for him and now can't find anyone to pick their crops or are losing their farms, the people whose health insurance becomes unreasonably expensive, the parents whose children contract polio, the true conservatives who become sick of T's bluster and self-aggrandizement, or are becoming shocked by the unnecessary violence of ICE, or are horrified by the destruction of the East Wing of the White House.  True fanatics may refuse to budge, but it's clear that a lot of people are already regretting their vote and thinking more deeply about the need for change.  Things may have to get even worse before enough people change their minds, but I believe that change is inevitable.  Here's hoping. 

In the meantime, I'm going to keep attending rallies and marches and protests.  It may not be much, it may not make a difference, but I can't do nothing.  Not now.  The danger to true American values - no, make that true human values -  is too real and too grave to stand aside and hope for the best.

The end of an era

About 20 years ago, not too long after I moved to Seattle, I began to work with an organization which puts on trainings for people all over the world whose work includes intense, high-stakes interactions.  Actors are used to portray people in different situations/crises/emotional states, etc. in order to give trainees a chance to practice their communication skills in a simulation.

The training which is conducted in Seattle is a program for journalism students, designed to give them their first chance to interview people going through a traumatic event.  Thousands of UW journalism students have taken this training, and the teaching staff have reported back how many of the students mention this training as the most impactful event of their educational careers.

Fourteen years ago I was asked to take over leading this program once a quarter, since the current leader was moving away.  I had really enjoyed being one of the emotional characters in the program's simulations, and I knew that to lead would mean giving that up.  Still, I was so flattered at being asked, I said yes immediately.  (It has occurred to me that I've done a lot of things I didn't want to do because I was flattered to be asked.  Certainly a lot of boyfriends entered my life that way.)  It's not that I didn't want to do this, because it is honorable, challenging, meaningful work.  But I was terrified.  Easy to brush it off as Imposter Syndrome, which I suffer from even though I know I'm smart and capable and committed to excellence, and have the power to win people over (not everyone, mind you). Still, I was always anxious that the students have fantastic time, and what if they don't engage or don't like me or are snotty or don't get the benefits of this amazing training? 

Recently I decided to retire from leading this program, but not without qualms.  There is no one trained to take over leading.  This program is much too valuable to be allowed to disappear.  I felt a bit trapped.  However, the man who created this and all the other training programs was so gracious and appreciative for my service that he eased my qualms and assured me another way would be found for the trauma training to continue.

The day of my last session, last Wednesday, the teaching staff gifted me and the training's four actors with mugs, and handed me an enormous bouquet in a ceramic vase.  So very thoughtful (although I had taken the light rail that morning and ended up having to call Sweet Hubby to pick me up, since the flowers and gift bag and my own personal effects were too much to handle getting to and on and off the train.  Sometimes people give you a gift, sometimes a problem).

It was an emotional day for me, and not just because it was my last time to conduct the program.  Journalism and journalists are currently under assault in this country; it take more courage now to become a journalist than it used to.  Without being overtly political, I impressed this as much as I could upon the students, these fresh-faced young adults who are the future of the world.  It's their turn now to make of their lives and this country what they will.  I hope I've helped, even a little.

Good Old Dirt and other take-aways

 Sweet Hubby and I recently attended a film festival in Pt. Townsend, a sweet little city about 2 hours away from us.  This is an annual event for us, and we always have a terrific time.  There are 6 venues, but they are so close together, it's possible to see as many as 5 films a day.  Because of the rushing from screening to screening, our meals often consisted of a hot dog or slice of pizza or cup of yoghurt.

Altogether, I saw 2 full length narrative films, 12 full length documentaries, and 41 shorts.

My favorite film of the festival was "Come See Me in the Good Light", which introduced me to Andrea Gibson and her wife Megan Falley, both poets.  Andrea, the subject of the film, was poet laureate of Colorado.  This film follows the couple as they deal with Andrea's terminal cancer.  No other documentary has ever made me laugh as heartily, nor weep as fully.  Watching this film is like meeting two clever, funny, smart, magnificent people, falling in love with them, and then realizing one of them is going to die.

A favorite line that came out of that film is "Whatever you are feeling, label it love."  On the surface that seems a bit facile and new-agey, but as I thought about it, I realized there is a lot of wisdom in that statement.  My rage at the current administration, for example, is based on my love for this country and its highest principles, my love of justice and fairness.  Grief is based on the love we have for what/who we've lost.  I'm definitely going to keep reminding myself of this splendid idea whenever I am full of feeling.

Another wonderful take-away from the festival is this: "Parents lay the foundation.  Children build the house."  I don't remember which film it's from, but I think it might have been "Her Fight, His Name", a short documentary about Eric Garner's mother, who has survived a string of terrible losses, the worst, of course, being the murder of her son by police.

While waiting for a film to begin, I had a sweet conversation with another audience member, a woman who was very frank about having been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, although she must be in the beginning stages.  The best part of the conversation, the part I have taken with me and want to share, was when she said that she thinks of God as Good Old Dirt.  And also Great Out Doors.  Now that's a god I can definitely believe in and even worship.  Thinking of god as the natural world strikes me as infinitely wise and practical, because it's possible to have a clear, concrete, enlivening relationship with Nature, and Nature is the source of all things.

We had a great time, SH and I, doing something we love together in a lovely place.  Who could ask for anything more?  That's what I would want on my tombstone, by the way, if I were going to have a tombstone, which I'm not.  But that is what I want you to know I feel about my life: Who could ask for anything more?

Hope

Somewhere along the way of my life, I began to be disdainful of hope.  I thought it was the flaccid (flak-sid), shrugging response of people who feel they have no power when confronted by a problematic situation.  "Oh well, nothing I can do about it.  Sure hope it gets better."  Hope felt to me like a mushy place to stand.

But I recently had an epiphany which gave me an entirely new way of looking at hope.  My siblings and I were talking about illnesses, and about how, if you live long enough, someone might very well discover the cure for what ails you.  And I realized that that is what hope is.

To hope isn't to pray.  It's not the belief in some intervening god.  To hope is being willing to believe that something you can't predict, can't be sure exists, may hold the seed of your salvation, no matter what problem you're grappling with.  Some genius is going to find the cure, the answer, the new technology, the new biology that will make the world a better place for more people.  No telling who it will be, when it will happen, if it will be the solution to your difficulty or someone else's.  But smart, committed people are working to solve the problems of the world (most of which we have created ourselves).  Hope remembers that she or he or they exist somewhere in space and time.  Hope doesn't solve your problem, but it makes the journey you're on a little less arduous.

I've never known what Emily D. meant when she called hope "that thing with feathers".  It's possible she was saying the same thing I'm saying now, only describing it more delicately, subtly, beautifully.  Or maybe she meant something else entirely.  It doesn't matter.  I finally know what I mean when I say "hope".

Daddy's demons

Daddy was moody. Some of those moods were light-hearted.  He had a sense of play and there was a lot in life he enjoyed.  But he could also be dark and sullen, or sharp and sarcastic, tight-lipped and private  He was sometimes passive-aggressive because he didn't seem to know how to say what he wanted.  He never, ever talked about his feelings, not physical nor emotional.  When his beloved wife died, lots of people attended, and there were no dry eyes in the chapel - except for his.

I worked hard to feel close to him, to understand and like him.  I went to movies and Dracula Society meetings with him so that we could have something to share, but as a child I was often afraid of him because there was no telling when his mood might change.  As I grew older, that fear became impatience and resentment.  I knew he loved his kids, in his way, but he didn't seem to be able to say "I love you", and he wasn't a hugger.

He's been dead now for 8 years, but of course he is still and always will be a reference point for me.  Even now, I continue to try to understand him, maybe partly because I'm more like him than I am like my sunny, cheerful, loving mom.

Last night I found myself wondering if maybe, possibly some of his moods were because he didn't have the life he wanted.  He had the life he was supposed to have, was expected to have, the life of a husband and father, a working man who put on a suit and tie every day and fought the traffic to go to his job as a petroleum engineer.  But was that what he wanted to do and be?

He loved movies, especially horror movies, and delighted in being around celebrities.  He was also an inveterate armchair conductor, and feasted daily on classical music.  He played the piano as a younger man, and would practice sometimes, but simply didn't have room in his life to focus on that or most other elective pursuits.

I wonder if maybe he wanted to be in the movies, or at least behind the camera in some capacity.  Or did he long to be a musician or conductor?  Some of his happiest moments were the three times he earned the opportunity to conduct fairly simple musical selections for the orchestra of whatever city he lived in.

He did love his children, but I don't think he really liked to be around kids.  He enjoyed us more when we got older.  Had he really wanted to be a father, or did he just see that as the right, the expected path for a man to take?

I think perhaps men of that era might have been almost as restricted in their choices as women were, at least a man like Daddy, to whom doing the right, the expected thing was very important.  I'll never know what bigger, wilder, more creative dreams he might have had for himself, how much of a sacrifice he was making every time he knotted that tie.  So I'm left to wonder, with a sympathy for him I didn't always have when he was alive.  And also with gratitude, because the way he lived his life made it possible for me to live mine exactly the way I wanted to, to follow my dreams and passions and interests and hardly ever do what is expected.

So thanks, Dad.  I wish I'd understood you better.

Oughtta, don't wanna

 A long-time but not intimate friend (K) died a couple of years ago.  She had been a best friend in junior high, but once I moved from where she lived, our friendship became more desultory.  We liked one another, but our paths seldom crossed.

I knew her husband, although not very well.  I liked him fine but I don't think he and I ever had a one-on-one conversation while K was alive.  After her death, I called him just to express my sympathy and concern.  The call seemed to mean a lot to him; they had moved not long before K died, and he hadn't made friends in their new town.

After that, I called a few more times, but every call was the same.  He would talk for more than an hour and I would listen and murmur "uh huh" in the right places.  He was never grim nor complaining; he had a dry wit and made a lot of puns, told jokes, just talked and talked.  He never asked me about myself, and didn't introduce topics of wider interest. I got absolutely nothing out of those calls except the thinly rewarding feeling that I was doing something kind.  My calls became less frequent and eventually I stopped calling altogether.

I have a friend (N) here in Seattle who is part of a gang I hang out with sometimes, most of us actors, all of us aging.  N has aged the most drastically.  He now lives in senior housing, and although his mind is still pretty good, his body is terribly, terribly fragile, and to have a meal with him means spending 2 hours watching him try to get food into his mouth.  I am one of only two of the gang who has ever visited him, and now the other one doesn't drive any more so it's just me.  N lives about 40 minutes north of me, so when the gang gets together, I'm expected to pick N up and bring him, which turns what would be a 2 hour outing into about 5 1/2 hours, what with getting to N's, getting him and his walker into the car, the drive, the gathering, the drive back.

So here is where I'm torn.  On the one hand, I have many, many blessings in my life, and can certainly afford to be generous with my friendship.  Being a friend to people who don't have friends is the right thing, the kind thing to do.  On the other hand, I'm older myself now, and more aware of how precious my time is.  I want to spend it doing things that are rewarding and interesting and stimulating.  I don't really want to spend an hour on the phone listening to the maundering of someone I didn't know all that well to begin with, and it's a pain in my ass to be N's driver and only friend.  I didn't have a friendship with N separate from the gang gatherings.  I like him well enough, but I just don't feel I like him well enough to give so much of myself for his sake.

I think I have the right to say "I want to do this, I don't want to do that."  I think we all do, at any stage in life, but certainly by our 70's, when there is so much more past than future for us.  For close friends, for family, for Bill, I would do anything and everything.  But for these peripheral acquaintances, I just don't know how much of myself I want to spend.  And yet I feel as though I must be awfully selfish not to be willing to make a boring phone call now and then, or clear my schedule so I can be a taxi.

I just don't want to.  Why do I feel I have to?  Why don't these men have other people showing up for them?  Why does it fall to me to make up for the fact that they didn't make friends?  I'm sure I could be more generous, but, sadly, I sometimes end up feeling impatient and resentful, although I do my best to stay attentive and kind.  I don't feel good about giving these men my shoulder, but I also don't feel good about denying it to them.  As I said - torn.