Ponder
🙈I find myself avoiding certain interactions at this point because there seems to be a slew of people who think they are at the mercy of an almighty “They” and I’m pained to keep my face just right when someone starts whining about how (insert, government, aliens, god, the local raccoon) have controlled their personal outcomes in health, family, love, finance, television viewing…well, I used to work for the ___ and had to clamp down on my internal dialogue when people of certain entitlements showed up at the airport sockless and complained about the housekeeping or the deprivation of personal rights because someone roused them out of their beds at 3 am and forced them at gunpoint to go to the Airport and catch a flight to Vegas – oh, right, that last part didn’t happen, but it was part of my job description not to cuff them up the backside of their heads and tell them their failure to pack less mess or wear socks and practical shoes while traveling, was not my fault.
🙉My mother was a Born Again Reagan Republican. It got so bad that my youngest brother once ended a visit abruptly and would not even return to bury her. His simple request was “can we not talk about CSPAN?” For lack of a better description, I suppose I am a left coaster “moderate” with more interest in issues than the cult of personality. I recently suggested that the government was our servant and not a babysitter which was met with a barrage of complaints about how someone’s HOA wouldn’t let them raise chickens so their freedoms have been taken and hence they had no part in preparing themselves for bad times. Prepping is funny to me. I have friends who talk the talk but were helpless as kittens as soon and the mountain money ran out. Who can really go from a steady diet of soft and easy processed foods to red lentils and filtered pond water without thinking maybe self-sufficiency is overrated?
Here’s the thing. I come from agricultural people who survived several wars, a depression, one escaped Bulgaria before Communists took over (and the Communists being an upgrade wasn’t saying much), and yes, a pandemic. They lived in “tiny houses” not as a fad but because they were upgrades from a tent. They thought electricity was a fad but when their children got landlines and indoor plumbing they never looked back.
I was in the military during the cold war. I was in the most hated of agencies after 9/11 and used to volunteer to help with Hurricane response because I thought the best help was the flappy thing at the end of my arm. I’ve experienced firestorms, ice storms, and other similar interruptions to daily life. Not being able to raise chickens is the least of my daily concerns.
🙊Emotions…there’s a side of me I’m just learning about. I watched my parents at the end of their lives and “lost” my job of 10 years when I turned 50. Lost is a casual word that doesn’t describe what happened at all. I believe I make choices but the verbiage is different for the workaday world. Navigating the job market at that age was so bizarre. For starters, I’m just a call it what it is kind of person. If I do not dive deep it’s because I have learned some people cannot deal with that hot stove. Every aspect of being unemployed was trying to trick or being tricked by people who could never say what a thing really was. Then you had to figure out what people really meant and perform a strange little conjuring ritual to convince them they needed what you were selling without ever actually saying what they were really getting. You couldn’t just say “I need a job, I show up on time and do the work.” They never said they wanted someone with better qualifications than they were willing to pay for to do the work of 3 other people they were going to get rid of. Even when I left the place I had been we had to “volunteer to be involuntarily separated” and that was the least bizarre thing we went through. Eventually, I found a great job with the Housing authority where I thought I could help people but I ended up with a kind of emotional Tourettes before that was all over. Altruistic goals have a price.
I eventually walked away from something I was good at because all along I wanted to write. I still can’t wrap my head around the idea of actually calling myself a writer even if that’s what I do with of most of my days. I’m reading a book called “By the Iowa Sea” by JoeBlair right now. It was a gift. Good writing even if the subject matter slides toward some grittier navel-gazing that isn’t always that interesting to me. One thing caught my attention:
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“The word “passion” is from the Latin “passionem,” which means “suffering, enduring.” What else could the word “passion” mean? “Good times?” “Happiness?” Passion has nothing to do with happiness. I think we all want to be happy. I also think we rarely are. Happiness, like the urge to write, is a virus we catch. Not on purpose, but randomly. It comes, displays its symptoms, and then it goes. And we’re left with a type of wistful nostalgia for this fleeting, accidental thing. This is our most common stance in the world. It’s not a balanced pose, rather a kind of suffering. Enduring. A kind of passion. Which, we all agree, is a positive thing. For some reason. We want to be passionate. And we want to be happy. It’s sort of like wanting to be sick and well at the same time.”
There’s something to ponder.
Question? have you ever had anything published? And if so what is the title of some of your books? Better yet the newest one?
@jaythesmartone working on it. Need a really good pen name. My own has already been used by someone else.
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I love that paragraph about passion & happiness. Definitely something to ponder.
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Good read this is. I enjoy reading your writing. It is always so well put together. The meat of the entry is displayed throughout it, if that makes sense to you. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and your family (even your youngest brother) 😎.
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You are a writer. i am so glad to be here with you again.
@legendarytangled mutual, if you didn’t already know
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