* I finished a book called Botanical Essays from Kent (by Tom Cooperrider, who I think I maybe met once? And yes, it is the Kent in Ohio - I grew up not too far from it and my parents knew people who taught at Kent State). Kind of interesting; I liked the chapter on Kent Bog the best. He also mentioned in passing a memorial that had been planted - an enormous number of daffodil bulbs, I think the number designed to correspond to the number of dead in the Vietnam War? which was also a memorialization of the May 1970 shootings that happened there.
That looms kind of large in my mind. Oh, I was a baby when it happened so I don't remember it but it was something people a bit older than I was talked about when I was growing up - and earlier this spring, the BBC did a program on the history of it that I happened to catch.
Also that same day some talk online brought up the Jonestown massacre - which I DO remember; it was the first big ugly "human doing bad" news story I remember (the first big sad news story I remember was from like six years previous to that - the big tornado break in Xenia - but somehow, it's a different sort of sadness I feel over a natural disaster than I do over a human choosing to do wrong. Tornadoes are not evil; they are not alive and do not choose to destroy. Humans who murder other humans do give into an evil impulse and make the choice to destroy another life - and usually with it, a family and friend group. I know family/friends of people who have been murdered and it is a very hard thing to come back from)
* I started a new book today. It was one I'd had on the shelves for years but thought maybe it would be good to read it now, especially thinking about fall teaching when I do the disease ecology section.
It's Gina Kolata's "Flu"
Yeah, I know. I'm having to be careful with it but in some ways it's been less upsetting than I feared (I'm about 1/3 of the way in).
A couple of things struck me:
- How much some things about the past pandemic seem mirrored in the current one. I daresay there seems to be more bumbling and getting-things-wrong now to me, given that we have, like, a freaking higher level of knowledge now (the structures of DNA and RNA were not even known in 1918, they were barely posited, I think) and the fact that people tended to go chasing after leads that turned out to be wrong later on.
- Kolata writes about how some of the military doctors, long after the pandemic was over, wrote their memoirs of the time, and she comments on how little they wrote about the flu pandemic, with a tone of "I don't get it, it was this big monumental thing, why wouldn't they want to write about it?"
And I am sitting here in 2020, in the middle of an actual freaking pandemic, and this is my reaction:
- She also quoted Thomas Wolfe's (lightly fictionalized, from one of his novels) account of watching his big brother die and holy cow. I cried at it, and did have to get up and walk away for a few minutes. Part of it was, the character Wolfe was writing (I do not know how much it was "him" or not) was essentially an agnostic, but he found himself praying over and over again: "Whoever You are, be good to Ben to-night. Show him the way...Whoever You are, be good to Ben tonight, Show him the way" and....yeah.
I've lost too many people in recent years and while I've never sat at someone's bedside while they died....that prayer, in a way, feels very familiar and not unlike one I was praying in late July of last year.
Like I said on twitter, I am going to need something very light and fluffy this evening to serve as a mental palate cleanser. Oh, the book is an interesting book, don't get me wrong, and I feel like I'm learning from it, it's just....hard.
Though I don't know. Maybe I need to toughen up. I suspect there's going to be a lot more "hard" before we get "easy" again, if we ever do get "easy" again, or even "pleasant"
* I wanted to mow the yard today and use the brand-new clippers that came to trim back the shrubs (was even going to get the stepladder out to get the really tall bits of the holly that I can't reach otherwise without scratching heck out of my arms) but it rained most of the morning and it was probably too wet later on. Maybe tomorrow, I hope.
I find that on days I can't get outside I do worse, especially if they are grey/dark days where there's no sun. I suppose recognizing that helps, in that I don't go "I'm in a really bad mood and don't know why," instead I go "ugh, it's overcast again and that's why I feel lousy"
* Maybe later this week I need to plan another jaunt out in the "just go and drive" sense like I did a few weeks back - not really go anywhere I'd plan on getting out of the car, but drive somewhere so I see some different scenery. Not sure where; but I guess if the point is "just driving," it doesn't really matter.
* Evenings are the hardest. I suppose it's getting through the entire day and not feeling like I've done much or had much fun. For a while I was even delaying getting into pajamas - in the before-times, some days when I got home, I'd change and put pajamas or something like them on around 5 pm and it was nice and cozy because it meant I was in for the night and didn't have to think about going out again or anything. Now it feels a bit like giving up and I admit there are nights it's been 10 pm an I'm still in my "day" clothes. (I usually wear a skirt and blouse or dress, as that's what I'd normally wear for working in the office and it feels important to try to have a few bits that are normal)
* Am hearing some reports that in some cities, firework usage is up and there are various conspiracy theories (which I won't quote) floating around but my feeling is....yeah. Even if it's absolutely the most innocent thing possible (bored people looking for something that resembles fun), I admit I would not be down with loud popping banging noises EVERY night. Around here it is bad enough the week of July 4 - I am find with a day or two on either side of the 4th being loud (well, provided we're not in Massive Drought so I worry about fires) but a whole week of interrupted sleep is a lot. Especially when a lot of us are sleeping badly as it is.
* Purlewe, in the photo with Patty, she is sort of sitting on my dad's stomach but has her front legs extended so they are standing on the arm of the chair. So kind of half sitting half standing? I guess?
2 comments:
LOTS of fireworks in my neighborhood and throughout much of Albany. Ugh. And sometimes even in the late afternoon, so you can't actually see it, but you can surely hear it.
Last night was the first night of fireworks that were actually professional grade. usually like I said to you they are M80s and bottle rockets. We were on zoom and everyone in my knitting group could hear them going off the whole time. I ended up muting us so we didn't ruin the meetup for everyone else.
Well Patty was adorable and her sitting like that was super cute.
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