Category: Thinking, thinking

Thursday’s Wandering Thoughts

The coffee shop banned a man. He’s middle-aged. White. He’s been coming here as long as I have. I know from conversations with him that he accepts and promulgates several sharply right conspiracy theories and also promotes some unusual Christian ideas about how aliens founded or influenced Christianity. It’s a web which I couldn’t fully untangle.

He’s always struck me as a little lonely, eager for friendship, hungry for validation. One morning this week, he came in, set up somewhere, and placed an order. I didn’t hear any of that. He returned to his seat, picked up is gear, and headed for the door. Pausing by me, he said, “I showed some of them my website the other day, and they’ve banned me. They said they’d call the police if I came in here again.”

Turning, he shouted at the counter, “What happened to freedom of speech?” He stormed for the door. Pausing there, he yelled, “Fascists,” and was gone.

It’s a reflection about boundaries to me. I don’t know what was said the other day or how his website was presented. I know of two other people who were banned earlier this year because they ‘annoyed’ other customers. I witnessed some of that, and yeah, they were annoying. I have mixed thoughts about this, about businesses banning people. I don’t know what was said between the parties but I feel for the folks who struggle, and that’s what I’ve always thought I’ve seen with the banned three.

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Wednesday’s Wandering Thought

A Tiger Swallowtail butterfly landed on a butterfly bush’s long purplish panicle as he approached the plant on his walk. Such a Zen moment, he felt forced to pause for consideration of the scene. Then the butterfly and he moved on, as though neither were ever there, leaving the bush standing alone and patient once again.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

Hello. It’s Wednesday, 7/12/2023. Mood: energetic

Gonna be 90 F here in Ashlandia, where the produce is fresh and the cheese is locally made organic. 66 F now — about 19 C — and you know I’m enjoying that. Trending warmer, but we are the fortunate. Looking south and east, a heat dome has settled over the land. In Arizona, wildfires rage. Their daily high temperatures have been over 110 F every day in July so far and isn’t showing signs of abating. That’s hot, friends. It’s even staying in the low 90s at night, so there is no relief. Feel for the land, people, animals.

Meanwhile, New England suffered heavy rains. Vermont experienced serious flooding. A warm, dry day is expected for them today, but more heavy rain is forecast for tomorrow.

Not feeling it? You might, if you’re in the US. That heat dome is expanding to the south and east. From Accuweather:

Temperatures to climb to extreme levels even for hottest part of US

More than 50 million Americans in the southwestern U.S. are under heat advisories or warnings as temperatures will take a run at records that have stood for nearly 50 years in some locations.

More than 50 million Americans in the southwestern United States are under heat advisories or excessive heat warnings as a blistering heat dome maintains its grip on the region. The heat will place additional stress on the energy grid, elevate the threat of wildfires and increase the risk of heat-related illnesses.

Temperatures will climb to levels unusual even for the notoriously hot region of the U.S., putting long-standing records in jeopardy. A sprawling area of high pressure that is positioned over the Southwest, known as a heat dome to meteorologists, is the culprit behind the extreme temperatures.

“This [pattern] will help to minimize the number of showers or storms and allow for intense sunshine that will help boost temperatures,” explained AccuWeather Meteorologist Andrew Johnson-Levine.

AccuWeather meteorologists say that the scorching conditions will increase heading into the weekend and even expand into parts of the Central states and Southeast by next week.

Here’s a link for your further reading.

Meanwhile, the 1966 cover of the folk song “Sloop John B” by the Beach Boys is playing in the morning mental music stream (trademark pending). I have a sense that the song was/is related to my dreams, but I can’t get through the maze to find the connections. Nevertheless, dream and sing have lifted my spirits, so I’m going with the flow.

Stay pos, and be strong. I’m going to have some coffee now. The day is on. Let us begin.

Here’s the tune. Cheers

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Monday’s Wandering Thoughts

Just finished with our monthly food and friends deliveries. Run by the county, it’s a thing where hot meals with milk and dessert is delivered free for people’s lunch. They don’t need to be sick nor elderly; they just need to have a home, even if it’s temporary. Clients can chose to pay, if they’re able. Monday-Friday are the delivery days. Clients can decide which days they want it. Frozen meals can be added to cover holidays and weekends. My wife and I do one route, but it’s one of many routes, and two of many volunteers. One friend does it twice a week, every week. Respect.

I always end up wondering how people reached this point in their lives and what were they like before. I wonder about their relationships, marriages and divorces, careers and schooling, where they were born, how they came to be here in Ashlandia, and if they have family. Ours is a small route, normally nine to fourteen people. Some are temps but others have received food assistance for years. When their name is dropped from the ranks, we wonder what happened to them. Sometimes we learn, and it’s what’s expected, they passed away. Other times, they’ve gone into assisted living somewhere, hospice, or moved in with family.

I’ve seen others can do this path. Most of us in the US are on it. My mother-in-law’s route was through Parkinson’s Disease. Then a fall really undermined all aspects of her coping mechanisms, leading to a long demise. While Mom and her BF don’t have meals deliver, visualizing a day when that happens is easy. He’s in his nineties, she’s in her eighties. Both have health issues but cope. Still, they’re declining.

I even see myself on that road. I’ve suddenly gained weight. Energy level has dropped. Lethargy has risen. I see a practitioner, and they sympathize but empathize, I’m in good health. Hypertension and enlarged prostate is all that afflicts me. What I’m feeling is just the general demise of aging. It surprises me because that’s not what I’m used to being like. I have a hard time accepting it.

I imagine all the rest are the same, wondering, what in the hell happened to me?

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Sa’day’s Theme Music

Talk around the coffee table yesterday was that everyone wants to go see Asteroid City. Terrific cast. Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Jeffrey Wright, Tilda Swinton, Bryan Cranston, Tom Hanks. If you’re a Wes fan, critics suggest you’ll like the film. If you’re not his fan, you might want to pass. We are his fans, so we might go. The subject is in the air. Don’t know where the currents will take it.

It’s Sa’day, July 8, 2023. Lots of room left in July at this point. Summer has slowed for us here in Ashlandia, where the day gets hot and the nights get cool. 66 F now, we’re expecting 92 around our homestead by mid-aft. I miss the annual blueberry pickin’. It would’ve already been done, and we’d have pints of fresh blueberries in frig and freezer. Some baking would’ve been done. But the drought and wildfire smoke killed it two years ago. Too hot, too dry, then too smoky. All conspired to take production down. Bushes died, and COVID took the heart out of it for the folks running it. Gone are those 6:30 arrivals at the gate, sipping hot coffee in cold mountain air as the sun pulls itself clear of the mountains and turns on the heat. Gone is the cold feel of wet berries in your fingers and the hunt down the rows for a bush that speaks to you. Gone is the hushed laughing and gossiping, more expected in a church than in a field picking berries, but all seemed to approach it as a solemn event. Well, almost all. There seemed to be one each year who had to be talking loudly on their cell phone while picking berries.

Thinking of those things reminded me of “My City Was Gone” by The Pretenders. Released in 1982, it’s about change. I’d been discussing change with others on a previous evening. I’ve seen change in Ashlandia, a shift in priorities, the decline of traditional events, the rise of doings that don’t matter to us. Our connections with the city and area are loose and breaking. We’re drifting away from it and no longer feel like we’re a part of it. Not as we were before.

I thought of Mom’s place in Penn Hills, PA, after that conversation. Her place has changed through the years, certainly. New siding, porches replaced, etc. Yeah, those physical changes took place, but its essence has remained steadfast. That’s what disillusions us with Ashlandia: its essence seems to be changing. Anyway, Les Neurons wedged “My City Was Gone” into the morning mental music stream, so here we are.

Well, stay pos, and muster the courage and strength to do it again. I’m building my energy to get out there with a strong dose of coffee. It’s what’s for breakfast, along with oatmeal. Here’s the music, and awaaayyy we gooo.

Cheers

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The Writing Moment

I walked around for days like all was alright. Although I smiled and engaged with others, I was an empty puppet, dealing with anxiety. The writer was agitated. The novel’s finish was supposedly in sight. That was the theory. He — the writer — knew the scantest bit of what was supposed to happen, like saying, you know it’ll snow this month because it’s winter and that’s what supposed to happen. That’s how nebulous it all was. So I kept thinking about it. What’s going to happen? Different avenues were considered and tossed out almost at once for different reasons.

I told myself, “I need to think about this.” No, I answered; overthinking matters, overanalyzing them, is your biggest weakness. Trust yourself, the writer. Trust the muses trying to guide you. Trust the emerging story. Don’t think. Just sit, drink your coffee, and write.

That advice actually worked. Two hours and almost sixteen pages later, what emerged astonished me. Never saw it coming at all. Yet it built on so many throw-away elements I’d embedded in the story as small pieces of verisimilitude.

Trust. Hard to win, hard to keep, even when it’s only with yourself.

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Monday’s Theme Music

And so the heroes arrived on Monday, July 3, 2023, after their exhausting journey through the treacherous months of May and June, coming at last to fabled Ashlandia, where the heroes are few and the animals are many.

Warm out there, and getting warmer. 94 F today, 97 F tomorrow. Which, for my household probably means 97 F today, 100 F tomorrow. A heat advisory warning us is out.

These are floof days. My cats just find a comfortable sleeping zone and stay there until around seven PM. Tucker has shifted himself to the back patio, by the house, on one corner, where a pleasant cool breeze sweeps by every now and again. Papi, more mysteriously, seeks out bedding under bushes on the house’s northern side, in the fence’s shadow. He’ll move to the front patio in late afternoon. But man, let me tell you, those cats are zonked out for that period. Water bowls are in front and back, ’cause I worry. They’ll partake, but they mostly sleep. Had a dream about them, too, but that’s another subject.

I have the Manfred Mann’s Earth Band cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “Blinded by the Light” (1977) running through the morning mental music stream. The cause was politically-oriented conversation with my spouse about the former POTUS, D.J. Trump. His supporters seem blinded by the light, IMO, unable to see any of DJT’s faults and shortcomings, just stumping for him, ignoring facts as they cheer and cheer. Just a strange sight to see. Of course, interviews with Trump supporters are often shocking, but the interviewer often seeks out the craziest of the crazy, painting a skewed portrait of DJT’s supporter. But, come on, when a man with his multiple marriages, children by various women, known sexist attitude, affairs, and stained business history is idolized as a saint, people will wonder, what happened to the supporters’ neurons? Where have they gone? Will they come back?

Stay positive, handle the weather and help others handle it. Remember to hydrate no matter what the heat or lack of in your locale. Coffee — which isn’t really good for staying hydrating but has such a wonderful smell and taste — ha, I sound blinded by the light, don’t I? — is served. Let’s rock.

Cheers

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The Resemblance

He thought he saw a friend entering the coffee shop, staring at him as the other passed.

Impossible, of course. His friend, Andy, died back in the early part of the century, murdered while on a business trip in Tennessee, a story misted with mystery. Andy and a woman he’d met at a bar talked to a man in the bar about buying a boat. After some drinking, the three went out to the man’s house at midnight to see the boat. A fight ensued.

Andy always carried a knife and pulled it now. The knife was taken from him. Stabbed twice in the abdomen, he staggered half a mile down the long dirt road leading to the house. A trooper found him dead on the roadside hours later.

All that came back as he watched the man with the remarkable resemblance to Andy. Other possibilities could explain why the man looked like Andy. It could be Andy. Andy could have returned from the dead. Andy’s death may have been faked, the death story constructed as part of some larger con. Maybe Andy had a twin he didn’t know about, or he’d crossed into a dimension where Andy still lived. Theories crowded his head as Andy’s doppelganger took his coffee and departed the establishment.

He couldn’t let it go. Catching up, he called, “Andy.”

The man turned back to him. A smile flickered over his expression. “No. Not me.”

Sipping his coffee, the Andy twin turned and hastened away.

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Thursday’s Wandering Thought

A new electronic traffic message sign was up, warning me of a delay ahead. Bare orange, very functional design, basically just whatever was needed to hold up the big black sign with its electronic orange characters to give the message.

Sort of surprising. I thought with all the naming/advertising frenzy going on, with companies buying the rights to naming stadiums and other facilities, buying the rights to name a construction sign or advertise on it would be a no-brainer. “You deserve a break today. Stop at McDonald’s after you’re through this mess.” Then Micky D can add two golden arches to the sign.

More inventive and creative types will go the old Burma Shave route.

“You’re trapped in a car. Surrounded by tar. Fortunately for you, Starbucks isn’t far.”

What names would you expect to see advertising on or naming electronic traffic message signs?

“Orange cones put you in mind of anything? Dairy Queen is ready.”

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A Small Rant

A small rant, s’il vous plait. A first world thing. First, apologies.

Apologies to the people being denied rights for me being so upset by my ‘plight’. Apologies to women who have lost control over their bodies to male-dominated governments who arrogantly decide what is right and wrong for you because of what they decided their religion tells them, regardless of your religion or circumstances.

My apologies to those dying in wildfires, or fighting wildfires, or enduring the terrible smoke.

Of course, apologies to people still getting COVID, still dying from it, or coping with long COVID.

I’m sorry, everyone having heart attacks and strokes, or dealing with cancer, and other diseases.

Likewise, apologies to everyone still rebuilding after a hurricane or tornado flattened your domicile, or who lost their home, loved ones, and belongings in a flood or other natural disaster.

My abject condolences and sincere apologies to the LGBTQ+ community and the indignities forced upon you by people too ignorant and uncaring to give you sympathy or empathize with your situation, who instead monstrously decide to compound your problems by building bureaucratic walls and persecuting you.

I apologize for those who have governments who think material goods and wealth is more important than health, security, and welfare of their citizens.

Apologies to the victims of racism and sexism, discrimination, and hate crimes.

Apologies to the food insecure, to the homeless, to the murder victims, gun violence victims, and police brutality. Apologies to the abused children, to the mentally ill who can’t find help, to the struggling and working poor, and the refugees around the world. Apologies to the people dying in famines and wars, and apologies to those working multiple jobs just to get by. Apologies to spouses with cheating and abusive partners. Apologies to the desperate and hopeless.

I haven’t covered everyone but I’ve done what I could, apologizing to everyone who has truly serious matters to deal with. That out of the way, you wouldn’t believe how long my Microsoft update took today.

So frustrating, you know?

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