[Above photo: Cleaned chanterelles, a bounty of island beauty.]
1 August 2023
The Island is a nursery for all manner of plants and beasts. The Ruby-Throated hummingbirds alternate turns at the feeder. Four of them use it, one at a time. If someone arrives before their turn, they are fiercely driven off. Two males and two females, trying to feed their hatchlings and put on some fat for the journey to Mexico. Their hearts can beat up to 1200 times per minute, although they generally run in the 600-700 BPM range. The occasional wasp tries to encroach on the sugary feeder but isn’t tolerated.
The Merlin app from the Cornell Ornithology Lab is so handy for a lazy bird-watcher like me. Not only can it identify a Black-Billed cuckoo’s song, the song can be returned, with variations on a theme. Those birds winter in S. America. What couch potatoes we are! The nesting pair of osprey likely have young ones; I can’t spot them but the adults raise an uproar when I approach a certain chanterelle patch on the SE end of the island.
And speaking of chanterelles! I’ve never seen such abundance. Buckets and buckets. I’ve frozen three large ziplock bags half-full and have as many drying. Others have taken more than that. And many others are still in the ground, food for slugs and pill bugs.
My high bush blueberries have exploded with all the rain, growing more in one season than in the past 8 years. And all are filled with plump berries. Nothing beats walking around the Island and sampling the wild blueberries, however, which are superior in flavor. And the raspberries are not numerous but enough scattered around for everyone’s pleasure.
For some reason mosquitos are not as abundant as in years past. Although pleasant for the humans, the dearth may cause issues for the bats and others who depend on them.
I heard a very disturbing tale today from one of my Myanmar students who moved for safety reasons from her home in Mandalay to a rural village in a conflict area. She had felt protected by the ethnic militia until a week ago when the Tatmadaw settled into a camp nearby and blew up an adjacent village, using artillery and plane strikes. Yesterday they seized two young men in her village who were carrying medications for her clinic—she is functioning as a GP, rather than as a psychiatrist, since she is the only doc in the area. After torturing them, they killed and buried them in the jungle. The bodies were exhumed by their families and they’ll soon have proper funerals. Only carrying medications!! The tales of rape, torture, murder, burning of villages, bombing a concert (killing 74), strafing an elementary school (killed 11 children), and other atrocities perpetrated by the military seem endless.
A monk, whose monastery is supported by the Myanmar military and wealthy associated businessmen, has travelled to the US. He is visiting Burmese communities, trying to get them to stop sending money to the opposition. “The military has been trying to restore order.” There was no dis-order until the military coup. Merely a landslide of a popular vote in opposition to the military, which triggered the coup.
I asked my students today what they did with their rage at the military’s cruelty and greed. It makes me want to kill, then I fall into a slump and feel hopeless. I teach my students and send the opposition money each month. They understood what I said and were generally silent. A stupid question, I guess.
My brother, Chas, was here for several days. We traded recipes and chewed the fat, reviewing past shared adventures and noting how fortunate we were to have enjoyed them. We also talked about our mom, her shortcomings in the mothering department and her amazing qualities. Hearing his perspective helps me to let go of my bile, realize my own imperfections as a father, and see how much she actually did for us. She facilitated our adventures, among many other things. I feel guilty and ashamed not to have put this to rest 50 years ago, given all of my psychoanalysis. It is maddening, however, to realize how talented and bright she was and yet how she failed to experience any real interest in us and our minds. She was consumed by competitiveness with her three younger siblings for her own mother’s scant attention. Her mother was a bright but thwarted beauty, having to drop out of college at 19 because she was pregnant. Generational transmission of deficient affection! Emotional life, when you look closely at families, is so dratted complex, valence arrows shooting in every direction! I am realizing how sharp I can be and cringe to think of how I inflicted that on my kids when they were young.
“Mom, you did a ‘good enough’ job, as Donald Winnicott said”.
I loved Andy Borowitz’ title in the New Yorker last week: “Trump Has Almost Enough Indictments To Clinch the Nomination”. Senator James Comer, trying to pin a bribe charge on President Biden, drew a blank when interrogating Hunter’s former business partner and fellow Burisma board member, Devon Archer. He said that Hunter was “selling the illusion of access” to his father, the president and “never once spoke about any business dealings”. Hunter is a sleazy guy, as is Archer, who was convicted of defrauding a Native American tribe.
Joe Biden isn’t. Our return from a frightening COVID-inspired inflation is considerably quicker than that of the other wealthy nations who suffered the same, as is our job growth. Now, if the GOP didn’t block increasing taxes on those who earn more than $400,000/year, we could lower the debt even faster than the $1.3 trillion it has come down since Biden got into office. Funding the IRS adequately to pursue the ultrawealthy tax cheats has a remarkable return of 10:1 or some such. It’s a no brainer, unless you don’t think they should pay their fair share of taxes. I guess we know which party is in their pockets.
It seems to me there is a lot to admire in the old guy’s performance, including strengthening all of our foreign alliances and restoring civility to the office, despite the remains of ketchup stains on the wall. And what exactly is on this incriminating laptop? I’d guess if there was much of anything, it would have been trotted out by now. Or a year ago. It’s the same inuendo as in the “Biden Crime Family” suggestion. I think we know pretty well which is the crime family. It’s headed by the guy indicted multiple times by Trump-appointed judges. And Jared scored $2 billion over the Saudi Sovereign Fund director’s objection.
Reading this over it’s striking how reasonable are the hummingbirds, the osprey, and the blueberries and how messed up are the humans. Oh, that we were more instinct-bound. Most dogs are pretty darn good company. Rarely impeached or indicted. Even more unusual is a dog who serially stiffs his contractors, necessitating they file for bankruptcy.
A Psychiatrist in Myanmar 