Fog City

Well now, the summer has come and gone, but the Coronavirus is still with us and surging. Who thought this scourge couldn't be contained. Unfortunately there is no national leadership mandating the necessary safeguards to limit the spread. So we wait impatiently for big pharma to produce a vaccine. The waiting game continues with people eschewing guidelines risking the fate of themselves and the public. All this dominating the public's attention as the absurd presidential race comes to a merciful conclusion. Tomorrow, Nov. 3 we vote. Frankly our democracy is at stake. Will the absurd incumbent, spewing lies, derision, racism, unbridled authoritarianism, win and advance the plutocracy. Or his opponent trying to unite the people around basic notions of compassion and inclusion. Tomorrow will tell the tale!

The months long pandemic, with no end in sight, raised awareness for me on many fronts. How to interact with family and friends from a distance for example. Actions had to be thought out, planned and executed accordingly. Spontaneity took a back seat and rightly so. Most group actions were simply eliminated altogether. And as the holiday season rapidly approaches traditional gatherings will be rethought. It has been a difficult time but our collective resilience shines through. Children miss school, adults miss partying, money for most is a problem, unhealthy politics rolls on, yet humor emerges from all the misery. We are generally a hopeful lot. For folks my age, well we've seen society come unraveled more than a few times. However despairing each upheaval, it passed. Emotional devastation and heartbreak, whether from without or within, will subside eventually, hopefully. Although this trump train has been utterly depressing. And I come from the streets, where our anthem, mantra was "Fuck It." So seven months of growing a beard as a fuck it statement to the pandemic and trump's hypocrisy, took me back to a time when I disdained the establishment with every fiber in my body.

I've been reading many different authors expressing clearly and analytically their thoughts on our time in relation to history. Perspective always reassures the doubter, that's me, and visiting other, brighter, folks perspectives boosts my morale and off sets my cynicism. In the end, which is coming, when I want to close the door behind me, I turn my frown upside down and carry on. Ciao! 

All Souls Day

Peace

Fog City

2020 looks impressive. It certainly has a fluidity as a time marker. I do have a bit of a problem fixing myself now, in this time. Speaking the number and visualizing my past, in the broader historical picture, confounds. What the number really implies is I'm as old as the hills. When I'm out and about in polite society, of which there is very little, I realize begrudgingly, a good many were only born in this century. Century, another time concept to ponder. But what am I talking about. Time. The difficulty is relevance. Youth of this century, with accelerated changes, and narrow focus, can't and don't relate to the links of the past. Here is where I question my relevance. Only because the experiences of my long life journey, applied in a historical context, were significantly influenced by monumental events. Monumental to me. Here's the rub, and I'm sure it's common to all, those events which marked my time so profoundly, are meaningless to most of today's youth. Where does that leave me? I try to keep pace. But as my role in life's drama continues to diminish, and I'm relegated to staring and comparing, I continue to redefine my relevance in time. I'm not complaining mind you, I'm just feeling self-conscious about the obvious changes to grapple with while growing older. So 2020 comes into view not so much with my touchstones, but with those of my offspring. I'm grateful. 

Happy New Year!

Fog City

I've been in a slump. A reading slump to be exact. Once I read everyday, but my habits have changed due in part to a cultural shift. At my age, old, I viewed technology, especially social media, inundate society like a tsunami. I lamented the loss of my comfort zone. What to do? I decided to embrace the change and the speed it was happening. My sons aided my immersion into the world of devices. I remember a time, which seems surreal, when a transistor radio was the only device necessary. The fear and trepidation facing me, while learning and navigating constant obstacles, took awhile to overcome. I encountered a random voice with a certain explanation, which helped immeasurably. I learned intuition was the key. Intuition: instinctive knowing (without the use of rational processes). Here lies the poetic nature of interacting more comfortably in the digital world. Now when I get stuck, I don't cry for help. Usually no one is there anyway. I resort to intuition. I click icons backward and forward until the desired result is achieved. Risk and reward. The affect is tangible. Spontaneous, abstract, a degree of stream of consciousness are components I find in both poetry and the digital world. Surprisingly the time I once spent reading novels of choice, I'm now reading all sorts of random writing on line. I've adjusted. I think I read as much, but the source, the authorship, comes in waves and of varied lengths. Writing can be as short as a significant comment on a Facebook post, or as long as a featured article in the Atlantic Monthly. My effort is sporadic and the impact seems less. Albeit I've become more comfortable scrolling and navigating a tremendous range of sources, there is still a disconnect. Hence my slump.

So I take time to read novels, this is my current choice. Life is learning lessons. When you want to maintain a certain weight you push away from the table, or you stay out of the refrigerator. If you want to remain debt free you budget your money wisely. If you want to read and write you must portion your time accordingly. Easier said than done, right?