More than halfway through the year, a year that has been so very brutal. The virus, which brought an economic recession, and a president who is completely inadequate to deal with anything that isn't booming good news. Who is so thoroughly untrustworthy that I fear that he will "win" in this November's election. How anyone with any shred of decency could vote for him makes me despair of what we have come to morally and ethically. Some people say that the virus is God's judgement on the world. I don't really think that God works like that. The virus is judgement on a world where money means more than humans, where we have globalized our markets but not our concern for others, where even in the midst of COVID, a billionaire spent an obscene amount of money to launch a rocket to send "civilians" to the space station.
As if that space station has done any good for humanity in all the years it has been orbiting. At almost the very same time that the SpaceX rocket was launched, end May, a black man, George Floyd, was killed by a police man in Minneapolis. Unarmed, struggling to breathe, his death was captured on a phone camera and publicized nationally and internationally. It was as if a perfect storm was created. Suddenly something that has been known for decades, that more blacks are arrested, and killed, by police than whites, roared to the forefront as a cause that millions of people, not only in the U.S., were willing to protest about. March in the streets for. As I write this, the protests continue and two cities, Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington, are daily and nightly scenes of violence and reprisal not just from local police but from federal troops. They have become talking points for both parties. For Trump, struggling to come out on top in the upcoming election, it is an opportunity for him to portray himself as the only candidate who can bring "law & order" back to the U.S.
I found this article to be the kind of summation of the situation in Portland I would ascribe to: https://www.ncronline.org/news/justice/catholics-join-protests-and-wall-moms-portland-oregon
I believe we need deep changes in our society but those changes won't happen until we ordinary citizens say a resounding "No" to politicians who try to divide us and who advocate for a better law for the rich than for the poor. But, as I write this, I realize the enormity of changing a society. Even in my own small experience I have come to see the difficulty of encouraging people out of poverty, out of making bad choices. And of the latter, bad choices are something I myself struggle with all of the time even though, at my current age, my choices are now limited to making better choices about eating and exercise as I can't currently see how I can make a whole lot of difference in the society in which I live, considering I can't even vote here. But that's a whole other story. Suffice to say, if I have difficulty sticking to a healthy eating plan, when I find it so easy to fall back into bingeing on chocolate and ice cream, I have deep empathy for people who struggle with addictions such as alcohol, nicotine and drugs.
On to the virus situation here:
Here in Arizona, there is some news that the virus is supposedly weakening. But there are so many conflicting stories, just as there were in May, that I don't know if that's true. Here in our town of 45,000, there are more cases every day but the numbers are still holding at 300 having tested positive. Looking at the obituaries in the paper--something I have started doing through a kind of morbid curiosity--I have only seen 1 where the death was acknowledged to have been due to COVID. The people in the obituaries are still invariably over 80 years old, only a couple less than, in their 60s.
So the impact of coronavirus in my life is something like what the Catholic activist described the Portland riots as. I am aware that the virus is "out there" but, as of yet, it hasn't impacted me personally except for my cancelled vacation plans and inability to travel very far without wondering what will be open, what won't, etc.
I am reading quite a bit, writing some, thanks to my Irish writers' group, and watching quite a bit of streaming video too. And within all this, trying to figure out what my goals are at 68 years old. To stay lucid, to stay healthy, to be kind and not make this world any worse, those pretty well sum up my goals right now.
Some photos of what our area looks like right now with the monsoons and Richard's gardening:
As if that space station has done any good for humanity in all the years it has been orbiting. At almost the very same time that the SpaceX rocket was launched, end May, a black man, George Floyd, was killed by a police man in Minneapolis. Unarmed, struggling to breathe, his death was captured on a phone camera and publicized nationally and internationally. It was as if a perfect storm was created. Suddenly something that has been known for decades, that more blacks are arrested, and killed, by police than whites, roared to the forefront as a cause that millions of people, not only in the U.S., were willing to protest about. March in the streets for. As I write this, the protests continue and two cities, Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington, are daily and nightly scenes of violence and reprisal not just from local police but from federal troops. They have become talking points for both parties. For Trump, struggling to come out on top in the upcoming election, it is an opportunity for him to portray himself as the only candidate who can bring "law & order" back to the U.S.
I found this article to be the kind of summation of the situation in Portland I would ascribe to: https://www.ncronline.org/news/justice/catholics-join-protests-and-wall-moms-portland-oregon
I believe we need deep changes in our society but those changes won't happen until we ordinary citizens say a resounding "No" to politicians who try to divide us and who advocate for a better law for the rich than for the poor. But, as I write this, I realize the enormity of changing a society. Even in my own small experience I have come to see the difficulty of encouraging people out of poverty, out of making bad choices. And of the latter, bad choices are something I myself struggle with all of the time even though, at my current age, my choices are now limited to making better choices about eating and exercise as I can't currently see how I can make a whole lot of difference in the society in which I live, considering I can't even vote here. But that's a whole other story. Suffice to say, if I have difficulty sticking to a healthy eating plan, when I find it so easy to fall back into bingeing on chocolate and ice cream, I have deep empathy for people who struggle with addictions such as alcohol, nicotine and drugs.
On to the virus situation here:
Here in Arizona, there is some news that the virus is supposedly weakening. But there are so many conflicting stories, just as there were in May, that I don't know if that's true. Here in our town of 45,000, there are more cases every day but the numbers are still holding at 300 having tested positive. Looking at the obituaries in the paper--something I have started doing through a kind of morbid curiosity--I have only seen 1 where the death was acknowledged to have been due to COVID. The people in the obituaries are still invariably over 80 years old, only a couple less than, in their 60s.
So the impact of coronavirus in my life is something like what the Catholic activist described the Portland riots as. I am aware that the virus is "out there" but, as of yet, it hasn't impacted me personally except for my cancelled vacation plans and inability to travel very far without wondering what will be open, what won't, etc.
I am reading quite a bit, writing some, thanks to my Irish writers' group, and watching quite a bit of streaming video too. And within all this, trying to figure out what my goals are at 68 years old. To stay lucid, to stay healthy, to be kind and not make this world any worse, those pretty well sum up my goals right now.
Some photos of what our area looks like right now with the monsoons and Richard's gardening:
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