[Above photo: By popular demand: Long of tooth, rich of wrinkle, sleight of hair, soul-patch rising.]
10 May 2020
It is a challenge to think critically these days. Sewerage plant effluent may look like spring water, so many streams of “facts” gush out of my computer. My daughter just alerted me to Dr. Judy Mikovits and a supposed plot coursing through the Internet which depicts Tony Fauci and Bill Gates attempting to corner the vaccination market—“Maybe they actually caused the pandemic for profit and power.” If it is confusing for me, imagine what it must be for someone with a 10th grade education. Or less.
As I pointed out to the INGO Forum group last Monday, if anxious and uncertain, turn to your core values: love, kindness, curiosity, honesty, etc. They don’t eliminate the uncertainty but they can be a little LED flashlight showing me rocks and logs I might otherwise stumble over.
It does seem as if the world will never be the same, never revert to the same level of safety as pre-virus. Such care is required when going out—or staying home. Three big guys came into my apartment to fix my TV. Afterwards I wondered, What had they touched? Were they asymptomatic carriers? Yesterday I went for a walk in People’s Park with my former student, her husband, and her 5yo son. Aung (the child) sweetly took my hand as we walked along. Is there anything as wonderful as a child’s trust in you to protect him/her? Was he a carrier? The trees, grass, flowers, and shrubs all looked so vital and green and health-giving. The Shwedagon Pagoda was visible across the park at times, regally golden in the late afternoon sun. Some men were handing out free water bottles toward the end of our walk. Unthinkingly thirsty, I took one and swigged it down, then wondered if I’d just done myself in.
It is rumored that the government is starting to do more serious testing now. The peak in Myanmar is predicted for August. Sweden, noting how many more deaths they have than Norway next door, is regretting their “open-style” response. Which is nothing like the embrace we are encouraged—in some cases ordered—to endure in our country to get the economy, and stock market, roaring again. Clearly DT doesn’t want to ramp up testing because, if you can’t test, you don’t get the full numbers. He’s sunk, anyway, after this performance.
I sent around a sad and hilarious video of Jason Klapper interviewing people at a Trump rally. It was conducted to make the Trumpers look like idiots, which they obligingly did. On review, it is very snarky and exactly what DT would have us do, further alienate ourselves from our neighbors and I feel a little ashamed taking such pleasure in it. I realized that in mau-mauing my brother Chas, repeatedly, I really have been expressing my own fear and trying to gain some control by changing his convictions. I’m worried about the virus but much more about the state of the nation: which dishonest, greedy, and lawless path our leaders will walk us down, their hands in our pockets. It makes me frantic to see the drivel and lies pour out of His mouth and be totally unable to influence it. Well, I can vote. I am giving $ to Democrats. But even the Dems are awash in money and too beholden to banks and Wall Street and big corporations. So it is time to stay in touch with my fear and uncertainty, my desire to control things, and the knowledge that only by trying to connect in an empathic way with other’s fears (and hopes) will I help, rather than add to the corrosive wave sweeping over us all. I’m grateful for my enlightenment, resulting from a 1 ½ hour conversation with my daughter, Ariane.
Ari said a contractor she knows had just gotten 4 calls from New Yorkers looking to buy and build in Maine. It may be that city dwellers will begin to arrive and land prices will start to move up soon. I’ve located a piece of waterfront property that looks lovely and Ari will visit next week. If it looks good up close—and the location on Eggemoggin Reach appears perfect — I’ll buy it to develop later. It would be largely my winter place, since I will spend summers on the Island. I realized that, given good internet, I can teach from there as well as from here. I won’t decamp just yet but if I am going to be confined for years, better there in nature than here in a penthouse. I do love looking at the amazing amount of traffic on the river in front of me, however. Yesterday I counted 30 small open boats at one time ferrying people to the far shore. Plus, limitless numbers of barges, small dredges, large freighters, and other watercraft.
I’m settling into the idea that I’ll be single for the duration. I don’t want to marry again but I’d thought maybe a mate was possible. I’m pretty sure I don’t want to live permanently with anyone, however. I have been reluctant to call any life possibilities off the table until now. Stephen Arkin, a friend from New York days, recently died in San Francisco, which snapped me to attention. Age is foreclosing on my fantasies. Although fit, I have brown spots all over my body and hair sprouts more vigorously from my ears than my scalp. Removing my beard makes me look younger in one sense but also reveals wrinkles that were less obvious before. A metamorphosis. I’m turning into something softer, spottier, and more wrinkled. Not a cockroach, happily. It is more strange than sad to me.
It is time to bake some bread and go to Marketplace for supplies. I am sorely missing marinara sauce. I buy it in a jar and then add more basil, garlic and onions.
A Psychiatrist in Myanmar 