Double Standards

I have done myself a massive favor and stopped looking at nearly all social media in recent months. I highly recommend the experience, because, as it turns out, nearly 100% of the people you know are slightly (or more) below the threshold to be considered subject matter experts on much of anything. Therefore, not having to look at their memes and read their half-baked notions has been a great step toward not routinely searching for an ice pick, with which to give myself a lobotomy.

It's only a useful platform if you engage with, and amplify, the messages. And, for what it's worth, the messages are usually just second-hand outrage anyway, absent critical analysis. It's, "I saw this on my TV and now I'm mad about it!!"

You can be mad about things. You can be downright fired up, that's always allowed. You're always allowed to feel how you feel, and you're even allowed to share how you feel. Your Free Speech is protected, so knock yourself out.

I guess it would just be my preference that if you're going to get that fired up, it would be something you arrived at on your own? Saw with your own eyes? Heard with your own ears?  Because if the origin of your outrage is something you saw on TV, or read on social media.... do you even know? Do you know the source?  Do you know if it's true? Or are you just super excited that someone gave voice to something that you had hoped was true, and now you're treating it as true because, hey, someone else said it?

***

Remember that favor I did myself?  Today I decided to glance at Twitter (or Xitter, whatever it's called now) and saw the top trending topic was "Treason." Very normal things. It's an election year after all, and we've reached the point in the saga of America where the only want to get elected to any national office is to destroy the credibility of one's opponent, regardless of the credibility of the claims. Couple that with the evolving desensitization we all experience with each new level of fuckery, and what accusation is left? 

Consider that in the last decade, our institutions have been occupied by serial liars, adulterers, rapists, draft dodgers, thieves, scandalmongers, and worse. A sitting Congresswoman went to a public theatre and got felt up by Not Her Husband, there was video evidence of this that also showed her vaping in front of a pregnant woman (who asked her to stop), and literally nothing happened. Not because she's such an incredibly valuable leader or politician, but because her party holds an incredibly narrow majority and they need her vote. Politics, baby! The needs of the country and world be damned, we need to own the libs here!

What would shock you? In your wildest imaginative fantasies, what would really shock you that hasn't already happened? 

Really think about that for a minute.

I'm a pretty creative person, and I'm struggling. I bet you are too. Because it's all been done.

Now we have some accusations flying around so outrageous that you just HAVE TO question their validity, even though you'll never, ever receive indisputable evidence one way or the other, and that's because the accusation is enough. 

I remember in 2016, when, just weeks before the election, a completely unfounded rumor began to circulate that Hillary Clinton engaged in a practice called, "Spirit Cooking," and it sounded really bad, so bad that, if it was true, it really would have given me pause about voting for her. But was it true? How would we ever know?  Because someone said so, and then a million other people repeated it?  Is that the standard for truth now?

Obviously, no, that is not what makes something True.

Sadly, though? Truth is no longer the objective.

INFLUENCE is the objective.  It's the only thing that matters. 

If we can be influenced, we can be made profitable; our emotional reactions can be directly equated to dollars and cents.

It really could be that simple, but the outcomes are so wide-ranging and disastrous.  Consider:

-We're electing people to positions of real influence who have no legitimate business leading or influencing anything;

-We're denying Science and Logic in favor of Hype and Clicks;

-We're letting people have power, and they're using the power to strip freedoms from others;

-We're HOOKED on the drama, as if someone is going to one day emerge victorious.

I want off that ride, forever.  Sorry, but not sorry - nothing good is coming from this. There was a time when being more informed meant you were prepared and could make good decisions, but now? I don't even know how to be legitimately informed. I know how to have information blasted at my face, and I have very little idea which information is valid and real.

***

Treason was trending because some people said that declassified documents showed that the Obama White House wanted to know everything that was going on during the Trump presidential campaign, and then a whole lot of more people repeated it, adding outrage and other emotions as the story snowballed.

My position on this issue remains unchanged: It's the job of the president to protect the citizens of the US from all enemies, foreign and domestic. Obama wasn't running for president in 2016, but he was still president, and was doing his job to ensure our safety from foreign interests. It's so obviously and distinctly the polar opposite of treason that continuing to call it out, as if it's some long-sought smoking gun, is maybe the biggest self-own in the history of Morons.

Yet, here we are.  In an election year.  And people are Deeply Influenced, yet again.

Ka-ching.  

Weeds

I've never understood weeds.

Academically, that's not true. I know what the word means, and I know what makes something a weed: they're invasive, and they choke out the life of other non-weed plants.

At some point, it was decided that some plants are desirable, while other plants were deemed very undesirable. And with that, an eternal struggle was set into motion.

Evolutionarily, I imagine we've got a bit of this struggle baked into us now, don't we? One thousand years ago, the stakes may have been higher than, "This plant is good, while that plant is bad."  There is a very real possibility that the struggle could have been characterized as, "This plant will feed us and keep us alive, while that plant will destroy our crop and we will not survive."

Maybe that's why I have the urge to pull weeds sometimes. Sometimes I see a prickly plant in my yard or garden, and I don't think, "Get rid of it so we can live!"  But I do think, "Lol, stupid weed, you don't belong here." And I guess the adjacent tomato plant might agree.

The funny thing about weeds, though, is their persistence. Unlike a fruit tree, or a vegetable plant, weeds don't need the perfect amount of water or sunlight, and they don't need very specific nutrients in order to thrive. Even when given only the bare minimum of nutrition, weeds can outlive just about everything else. On the hottest, driest days of summer, when yards are crunchy and brown, weeds stand out, vibrant and colorful, just happy to be here.

I pulled one such weed five or six months ago. It was pretty tall and I didn't have time to do much more than double it over and toss it in our compost bin (which really is a term of affection and nothing more, seeing as we created it with the hopes of making compost one day, but instead, it sits in the back corner of our yard and collects yard waste. It's a yard waste bin, really.). I might not have minded it so much, but it was certainly robbing nutrients from the adjacent tomatoes, and I was hoping to get a few more edible tomatoes before the season ended.

A few weeks ago I noticed the weed doing quite well, having emerged from one of the drainage holes I drilled into the side of the bin. Then a couple of days ago, I saw that it was out even further despite sub-zero wind chills, little sunlight, and less water.

Interesting, isn't it?

Alive, somehow.

Growing, somehow.

GREEN, SOMEHOW.

I'm sure if I thought about it for a while, I could figure out how this is possible. Maybe the snow on top packed in tight enough, then melted some, then froze and formed a seal, and the activity inside, that of decomposition and decay, was generating a little bit of heat. Maybe that heat was enough to melt the tiniest bit of ice, or maybe that happened anyway when the sun did peek out.

However it happened, just look at that: that plant isn't dead. Its roots are doing enough to keep it alive despite a most inhospitable environment. And look at how small those holes are, yet this weed, this abomination, continues to issue forth and develop, following the instructions for survival written within its genetic code.

I took this picture while I was in the yard making sure the dog didn't get frostbite. Our dog, who is covered in fur and has herding and survival instincts, could not be out in these very temperatures for more than a couple of minutes before she started to lift her paw to show me, her face plaintively begging me to pick her up and carry her someplace warm. With wind chills between -10 and -20 degrees Fahrenheit, I could not be outside for more than a few minutes without feeling the initial stages of pain and discomfort that I know to be precursors of frostbite. My frail body would not be able to survive for much more, yet here is this despicable, detestable, offcast monster, unwanted and unneeded, just going right ahead and gathering what little bit of sun and warmth it could, while it could.

Beneath inches of snow, my entire yard lays dormant. Some of it will emerge from the winter, eventually. For now though? It's buried and, for all intents and purposes, it's dead. Certainly not persistent enough to push through the snow and ice to gather what little drops of sunlight it could in order to keep growing.

And we hate these weeds while we love these blades of grass.

What does that say about us?

This weed could very well survive anything, but it must have been deemed worthless and useless, right? Otherwise they'd be everywhere and we'd all know what they were, and how to utilize them, and we'd appreciate their hardy tenacity. Right?

Months from now, not terribly far into the future, the snow will be gone, and the sun will return to warm everything, and spring will happen once again. And when it does, I will have the choice, as I do every year, to go outside and evaluate my yard's needs: I will have to decide how much time and money I want to spend in the hopes of improving its health and appearance. Grass, it seems, is terrible at surviving: it cannot fend of threats to its existence; it cannot thrive without the perfect amount of sunlight; it must have a perfect balance of wet and dry; it must lay upon nutrient rich soil.

And the weed could very well be double in size by then, if left to do its thing.

Entire industries exist to help us keep grass alive and green and full, so that we can run it over with machines to manicure it to the perfect length and help to to grow even fuller and greener, just as entire industries exist to dehydrate and destroy weeds.

One is good despite needing constant upkeep and being too weak to survive on its own; one is bad despite its ability to overcome significant obstacles and harm.

Perhaps it is because we've become more like the grass. Can we really thrive without all of our comforts? Or have we reached a point where we cannot survived being uprooted and left to die? Maybe, like the grass, we need someone to come along and care for us from time to time, having recognized a need in us.

I would really like to think I'm not like the grass, and that I could survive anything, too.  In some ways, I already have.

But I'm no weed. Not even close. I have my breaking points - we all do.

We can only take so much.

Maybe pulling weeds is wrong, but it's a Wrong that we've all accepted and normalized to the point that we feel good about doing it. Killing is rarely acceptable, yet nobody would really mind if you pulled a weed out of the ground and set it on fire. It's something we Can do, something we Can control in a world full of problems we simply cannot solve.

Maybe the more something is targeted for destruction, the more resilient it becomes.

Maybe that's not so terrible.

The Things You Can't Remember

Last night I crawled into bed and checked my alarm on my phone. Only then did I realize the date and what significance today would hold.

Suddenly my sourness and grumpiness began to make more sense. I'd taken the day off and relaxed yesterday, and I really didn't think I had much reason to be so down.

Seventeen years earlier on October 23rd, I crawled into bed not having a clear idea what would happen the following morning, despite having a general sense that it was going to happen at any time. I had a bag ready to go and we were prepared to notify our employers at a moment's notice that we needed to leave and be gone for a few days. I was in my first semester teaching ESL to college students and still really trying to figure it all out: I had a full-time course load, I was teaching different curricula than before, and for the first time in my life, I wasn't living in the state where I grew up. Literally everything was in flux and I felt like I was constantly scrambling for any foothold in any aspect of my life.

Six months before that, I was a permanent substitute teacher for a semester-long appointment, teaching Language Arts to five sections of 9th graders. One day I came home from work and answered a call from my dad; he was calling to tell me he had cancer.

I look back on that time, from March to October, and so much is a blur. I know we visited Indiana a lot, and I know we talked on the phone a lot. I believe we had plenty of time to be there and be supportive as he underwent difficult treatments, and eventually a surgery. We couldn't be there all the time, but I know we were there as much as we could be. I have a few memories that stand out from that time, but it's mostly hazy now.

At some point, we knew he wasn't going to make it. I vaguely recall that it was only a few weeks, but again, I was four hours away, learning a new and difficult job, and just trying to get confident in that. I don't remember now if we visited during those few weeks. I don't know if we'd have been able to.

The last meaningful visit I am certain of, and the one I consider my goodbye and how I remember him, was the trip we took to Lambeau Field that July for the Packers Shareholders meeting. Lauren and I took dad, and though it was hard for him, we did it. Because of the radiation treatments on his neck, he had a lot of mouth and throat pain and had to use this numbing mouthwash every 15 minutes. He wanted to drive (he loved to drive) so I sat in the passenger seat and measured that medicine out for him so he could try to be in less pain. At Lambeau, we had a long wait in line for the stadium tour: the line did, quite intentionally, wind by an open concession stand in the concourse, and we decided to get a beer that we'd enjoyed on a previous gameday, Brett Favre's VooDoo Brew. It was kind of an amber ale, if I remember, and he was really excited to have one, so I went up and bought two (I recall that Lauren was not quite 21 or it would have been three). Dad took a sip and winced harshly as he swallowed, then shook his head and said he couldn't do it. So I drank them both. Later we walked up the players' tunnel and into the locker room, on the way to which he posed with a large picture of his hero and favorite player, Bart Starr.

Looking at this now, I can see he had lost weight, and of course, his neck looks red and raw from the treatments. But I remember how he stood there with his chin up and smiled so proudly. He had told us many times of going to a game with his dad, and how he got Ray Nitschke's autograph on a program, but how he was too afraid to approach Bart (and that's always been funny to me because Ray was the meanest looking sumbitch that ever played the game - the face only the mother of a linebacker could love!). 

That trip was special, and I'm glad we had it. 

Minutes passed and it was October 24th. I remember getting a call early, maybe around 5:00 a.m. I knew why it was ringing. After hearing the news and saying we'd be on our way, I can remember almost nothing. Time became incredibly elastic. I don't remember the four hour drive at all. I don't remember what we did first when we got to Delphi. I have fleeting images of being at the funeral home and discussing plans. I now recognize that I was in shock, and that I remained in shock for several days. I'm sure it unnerved a few people that I was so happy at his visitation, but I was still in shock and, also, genuinely happy to see so many people who meant so much to us.

Ever since then, October 24th has been this day to remember, and I'm confident it will always be that way.

Nevertheless, today, as I was driving to work in the dark (at least, most of the way), I took note of the drive. If this day in 2006 was anything like today, and I have to imagine it was, the leaves in Michigan have begun to change color, and I'd estimate we're at about 60% "Fall" color. At one point, a single Sandhill Crane flew over my car. I have gotten out of the habit of listening to podcasts recently, favoring music instead, but today I chose a Conan O'Brien podcast with his guest, Sir Patrick Stewart, the latter of whom spoke at length about his childhood and his parents. I just tried, and I am continuing to try, to be mindful of the day.

Last night, I said something to one of the kids that I had heard my dad say hundreds of times. I had a headache and some serious brain fog, so I don't even remember now what I said -- I just remember that after I said it, I remembered hearing it so many times in his voice.

My memories are good ones. That hard times, and even the saddest times, have calmed over time. I now effortlessly remember him in the context of my life. In moments, I sometimes picture him there, in that moment, and imagine how he'd react.

Last night I was cooking while Brooke and Evan were watching a movie in the living room. A little later, Winter came out and joined them. Winter and Evan kept cracking joke after joke while sitting with Brooke, and I eventually finished what I was doing and sat on the other couch (due to my headache, I thought I might want space to lie down). Dad would have been unable to control his laughter in that moment, just hearing them crack themselves up, much in the same way the he would when he was trying to tell a joke but was too tickled to deliver the punchline.

I hate that he's gone, but I love that he's so frequently present in my thoughts, and that his presence is so easily imprinted on my life and my experiences. As I age, I understand him better all the time. I miss him, but in many ways, I am him.