A million and a half people on the verge of starving and I wonder how is being on the verge of starvation different from starving itself?
Last night I made pasta. Defrosted sausages and heated them in a pot of jarred red sauce. A husband-away meal. Plated it up. Ate only a few bites, leaving enough to save for today. Too much to give the dog in other words, the dog who I guess is better fed than a million or more people in Gaza.
My husband would’ve eaten the pasta and sausage with gusto and I suddenly wonder if his healthy appetite and omnivorous palate have given me an inflated sense of myself as a cook.
Tortellini, the name, was inspired by the belly button of Venus, did you know? So said one clue in one Sunday puzzle or other.
Many friends recently cancelled their subscriptions to the NYTimes to protest ongoing failures in reporting — the relentless old Joe coverage based on a shitty poll that the Times themselves conducted being the final straw.
That’s why I did my Wordle and Connections this morning in a fugue of guilt. Why let principles interfere with enjoyable, habitual puzzle-solving though? I have so little else I tell myself when really I have so much. A full enough stomach to turn my nose up at a perfectly respectable bowl of pasta, for starters. A dog who loves me. Closets full of warm clothing which I still need but look forward to not needing in a matter of weeks.
I have enough long-sleeve shirts to give four or five away because I don’t like the necklines or the color, one a dusty blue that I never want to put on. I can order gum arabic without a second thought and plan to devote two solid morning to making ink out of wasp galls discovered out back, ink that I don’t even know what I’ll do with.
I can use expensive sake to make risotto because there’s no Chardonnay in the house and I live in a house where these usually is Chardonnay somewhere — in the fridge upstairs, or the fridge downstairs, or resting in the mini-wine rack. You heard that, didn’t you? The part about having two fridges?
I hope there are a succession of weeks where I can wear a long-sleeve shirt, one with a neck-line I like of course, and a light cardigan, weeks when I can leave the windows gaping open with maybe a fan or two running, before the stultifying heat arrives.
The stultifying heat used to limit itself to a string of days in late July or mid-August. You could certainly get by without AC. But now some years the heat arrives before I’ve even gotten all the storm windows raised, dropping like a wet blanket on the landscape, making gardening or walking a chore and forcing us to close our windows. All of them.
I am so tired these days. I try not to say that even to myself but there I am mid-afternoon frequently of late saying not out loud but emphatically to myself, I’m exhausted.
How many years have we been doing this, a fellow traveler asks. It’s creeping up on a decade. The frothy ribbons of fear, the grunge of despair, the hyper vigilance have long since taken up residence and gotten to know each other. They don’t care if the windows are open or closed as long as the internet and cable are functioning.
Yesterday I brought that sake-infused risotto to a friend — she is grieving a sister who died and died suddenly due to medical neglect and/or outright error — and I forgot my phone, the phone with the credit card wallet. It felt weird. Like having sex without protection or entering a party where you can’t remember the name of the host.
I’d intended to stop and get flowers and a sweet bite, but I could only scrounge up nine dollars — eight from the eyeglass drop down compartment in the car and one from the treat pocket in my hobo bag. So I only bought flowers.
Counting out those bills felt so strange, almost awkward and to realize that was to realize how in between I am, for I also find it strange to call up my square code and scan it — where? where do I scan it? — to get my Prime benefit, generally something like $1.89 off the total.
Amazon owning WholeFoods, Facebook catering ads to conversations (not even KEYSTROKES), Facebook owning Instagram, the hideous helmsmanship of a racist, immigrant billionaire over on Twitter or X, formerly known as Twitter (— imagine being such a dick that you force people all over the world to utter or print those extra words over and over — X, formerly known as Twitter), what a conflagration!
Such hideous monopolies and intrusions make it hard to offer more than a shrug at TikTok and the idea of an adversarial superpower harvesting data from our people. I mean it’s not like Amazon or Facebook are exactly on our sides, are they?
I know my kids are smart enough to not to input phone numbers, addresses, birth dates — I hope.
On TikTok, I have yet to get past the Chinese hip hop dancers and the comical wombats at feeding hour, so it astonished me to learn yesterday that some huge number of people rely on the platform for their news. All of their news.
I started with starving Palestinians and so perhaps I ought to come back to them. Good gracious, I want to say, fuck the pier Joe, just cut Netanyahu off!
Can you imagine if Biden lost to a corrupt, autocratic megalomaniac who needs to return to power to avoid going to jail because he couldn’t say no to a corrupt, autocratic megalomaniac who has to hold onto power to avoid going to jail? No wonder I’m tired.
My old habits of outrage will not get going these days. I hardly recognize myself sheathed in a passive silence. But to support one feels like condemnation of the other — a regular funhouse mirror tunnel of allegiances. And to protest the killing, the genocide, too much is to risk everything here. I am committed — committed — to re-electing the guy with a brain and a moral compass.
It was so easy to stick a Black Lives Matter sign on my lawn. Give to the good causes. Take history on. Our history. American history.
But it was so complicated to take down, after a horrid and violently brutal few weeks of IDF retaliation, my I STAND WITH ISRAEL sign.
And then, a small defeated part of me wonders if perhaps in fact I know as little about the fight for racial justice as I do about the Middle East. Is that possible?
And, what cost my silence?
i read my
self
here. the one i am avoiding looking at. Here i am…..described perfectly
different details but the same even in this little water logged tin house
in the woods no husband but otherwise way more than any one person
needs
will go away now for a while, feed the Goats and then come back, read again
and think….i am not alone. Thank you. from the bottom of my heart to the
top of my brain
Hi Grace. Thanks for reading and chiming in. It helps to know we’re not alone in this.
that’s me, grace above…..why am i anonymous now?
I have no idea.
It let me (Deb) comment without logging in and so, also anonymous. Log-in for comments is optional.
I can relate. Why on earth do I miss spelling bee and wordle? Pathetic.
I find myself wondering why some dictators have been worth offing, but not Netanyahu. M
I am making little sculptures because I want people to feel something. Anything. Because I want to stop wondering when these AI Social Media data techno strategists (and their wankers) will wake up and come out of their caves to educate SCOTUS or find a way to impeach them? Making art keeps me sane.
I honestly think that time for waking up successfully was 30 years ago. Now we are all in a giant black widow’s spider web. History is dead. Will we save ourselves or each other?
I don’t think it’s pathetic at all.
Your art making is inspirational to me. I am going in rote circles there. Uninspired. I am just crazy enough to believe that it’s NoT too late. But we shall see, huh?
You are very kind regarding my art. Thank you.
And Im so glad you don’t think it’s too late to make progress, because you seem to look and analyze from every conceivable angle.
(((Dee)))
sigh
Hey Nancy!
We have enough. Our enough has changed over the many years but it has always been pretty basic: a roof over our heads, food, a bit of land, even as renters to grow some of our food, just enough clothing to weather the seasons, books, music, a laptop, a TV but no cable. A small amount of discretionary income that salves my soul as I use it to contribute where I find a need; lately, World Central Kitchen, to help in Gaza.,. What I do not have enough of is energy to do more than this, to rally myself to action, to stoke, as in days of yore, the fire in the belly, to take to the streets…
So many energy zappers, the wars, the hatred, the starvation, the loss of innocent lives, the authoritarian right growing all across the world, the return of the hate filled spewing puppet of a man who only belongs in one house, a jaiil house, just zaps me…I am tired and I could use the excuse of the daily duties involved in health care for an ailing spouse, they exist and it would be so easy to put on the martyr’s robe but I can handle this, for the most part. BUT what I cannot seem to handle is to summon that ember, that spark to do more than lament and turn away…and I take myself to task because turning away feels like such a defeat and damn it, I care and care deeply.
So this week what helped me in dealing with the state of America were conversations with the young nurse who comes to help twice a week. She asks a lot of questions, is a Democrat, a Native American, (from Nambe Pueblo) and her concerns lend themselves to these discussions of where our country is headed; of missing and abused native women, of Roe v Wade, of IVF, of the economic and educational problems on the reservation. but she takes it further, wanting to know how to deal with this election. So we talk over tea. I tell her my thoughts, of participating in protest marches;, of campaigning for candidates; of letter writing and going door to door; of attending my first ever caucus in Texas to vote for Obama and then moving to TN, that same year and voting for Obama in the national election; .of the Sister March in January in Albuquerque held after the evil one was elected.. I spoke of how now I wish I had the energy to do so again. She listened quietly and then said, ” I will march for you” .AND that is how an ember ignites…
Oh this gives me goosebumps and makes me want to cry. Of course you get to pass the torch! Maybe one conversation can change the world entire.
And thank you for the reminder about World Central Kitchen. I will give to them again today.
In today’s WA Post, 3/15/24, more on Jose Andres, World Central Kitchen and Gaza:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/15/gaza-food-boat-jose-andres/
Thanks Marti. I think that’s behind a paywall but if people google his name and “Gaza” other recent coverage comes up.
I love what you’ve written here .. a few weeks ago I listened to a writer by the name of Tommy Orange an American Indian. A few days later I was at an estate sale and saw much to my surprise his book There There and almost finished reading it I’ve already ordered his second novel called Wandering Stars which I can’t wait to read. I envey your conversations with the young nurse that you get to have conversations with. I’m grateful that you have her helping you … and grateful that “she will March for you”.
Dee not surprised that once again you’ve taken thoughts out of my head and finding all the beautiful words to put on paper. So much here I have already read it twice and know I’ll go back a third time. I hope you know how so grateful I am for your insightful posts. It is beyond belief what is all happening .. all you’ve brought to the surface here. It’s heartbreaking and scary .. infuriating and frustrating. Sending you heartfelt loving Blessings.
Thank you Tina. I’m grateful to you for reading and commenting. It makes me feel so much less alone!
how did you get inside my head and my heart to give voice to the deep unease … and why shouldn’t we be exhausted? … because it’s been a lifetime of WTF, from Vietnam to Reagan to Clinton (why the hell didn’t he resign?) and the Bushes … even Obama disappointed, deeply … and oh, did I leave out Watergate and Read My Lips and 9/11? … and and and … it has been endless … what a shit show and we’re the greatest nation in the world? I think not
but then there’s Marti … giving hope when and where it’s most needed … that we can still pass the torch, however dim the flame
The whole business about the moral arc of the universe being long but bending toward justice does seem in doubt.
Happy to see Schumer calling for Netanyahu’s resignation. Maybe those uncommitted votes are having an impact.
But then read a long Atlantic article (by constitutional scholars Luttig and Tribe) at the absolutely bogus SCOTUS decision regarding Colorado’s disqualification decision.
So up and down.
Thanks so much for putting into words what I often feel.
Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment!
So much is out of our control and that can feel both frightening and quite discouraging. I try to focus on what light I may add to the day/the world sound me, whether it may be a family member, friend, stranger, animal, garden, etc. A smile or word of encouragement, sharing something good, I can do this. The world is too much for me to carry. Stay strong, Dee.
Should say around, not sound. Sigh.
Sorry to chatter on but what you wrote has been much on my mind. Perhaps my first comment sounds a bit Pollyanna-ish when I look at it. But we can’t afford to let the darkness into our hearts because then the darkness truly has won. Stay in the light, I tell myself.
Not Pollyanna at all. I appreciate all comments and yours goes to perspective, reminding me how Rebecca Solnit talks about hope. That it is an active thing. To be striven for.
Also Robert Hubbell comes to mind whose daily (free) Substack I rely on for both updates on all kinds of things and for a dose of energetic optimism. He recently pointed out that come November 5 will we remember what Robert Hur said in the congressional hearing? Will it matter that we spent 1,000’s of hours following every detail? Because while I’m not about to walk away from the news, there are weeks (like this one) where the amount of it is daunting. And none of it encouraging. So I take your words to heart. Thank you.
Your words focus and magnify. I’ve been feeling the presence of that long, high arc of history my entire life. Maybe from growing up with newspaper readers, any and all papers except that one, so I added it to the discussion. The arc, never a rainbow, now a scimitar, extra sharp, since October 7. Not surprised at American Jewish friends unwilling to discuss what has boiled up. Bombings, ghettos and starvation. So, no signs in my yard, but I have resolved to take on that bigoted neighbor at the next meeting. Call out her Fox shit in front of eight ladies with very fat lives. I, the occasional alternate in their world, will be happy to have just one take my back. One to one is all we can do that matters.
I’m guessing this is Deb L?
Yeah, it’s me. WordPress is a mystery. Sometimes it forces a login, sometimes not.
I guess I should look into it. It doesn’t seem to recognize a lot of “regulars.” Sometimes it’s fun to guess who it is though.