PJ's pic was both a reality check and a metaphor for today--I just had to disengage from some tasks to focus on other more pressing ones. This has been a week of missed appointments and misunderstandings but luckily the work week is at an end and I get to rest, reset, and restore my settings.
I recognize the stakes for women, LGBTQIA+, children, POC, etc in this election. But I'm not happy with what seems to be the obvious choice either. I don't want "the most lethal fighting force in the world." (We already have the most lethal, most overfunded, most expansive military presence in the world.) I want an end to poverty and homelessness. I want accessible and high-quality K-12 ed and free higher ed. And while we're at it, I kind of want cool, high-speed rail systems...
I feel like even just four years ago, forgiving college debt, taxing billionaires, Green energy, and expanding Medicare was a bigger part of the conversation than it is currently. And hearing the two candidates basically argue about who'll deport more immigrants and conduct more fracking is dismaying. The Overton Window* of what seems politically feasible has drifted waaaay to the right and needs to move leftward...
*I've been using the term for a few years now, but I didn't realize until I went to link to it that it is homegrown in Michigan!
2) I read yesterday's comments, and I'm so touched by the concern and... a bit freaked out that I don't seem to be responding appropriately? It's not that I'm fearless--I was a proper ninny when there was that active shooter on the MSU campus in 2023. So maybe I'm just foolish or foolhardy from not recognizing the danger I was in? For whatever reason, this closer encounter with a gun seems not to have registered in my consciousness at all. And even as it was happening, I was translating it into an absurd dinner party story.
3) And I completely missed today's presidential debate. I doubt I missed anything significant. I heard on the news that 30% of people polled said they were waiting to decide whom to vote for based on today's debate performance--I cannot fathom what they could learn that hasn't already been repeatedly demonstrated.
Pic: Young the Giant in concert at Pineknob Theater.
Max is a goofball whereas Scout was a sentimental intellectual-savant, but they do look a lot alike and have some very similar habits. Like Scout, Max loves to be with me when I light the oil lamps in the evening, and sighs the same way Scout did when he settles himself for a nap across my legs, he even plays catch in the same silly way.
Every morning when we wake up, the first thing Max and I do is go out to the corner where we made a Scout memorial. I ring the wind chimes, while Max (less sentimentally) pees. The other day I was playing catch with Max and he came around the corner just as Scout used to and as I mussed his ears and face, the solar lantern flickered awake although it was not at all close to darkness. It truly felt like Scout was laughing in the moment alongside us.
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I woke up from an intense dream last night in which my dad was asking why I hadn't placed a "pottu" on him. For the most part, this is a benign request--you'd place a pottu (the vermillion mark) as a blessing; I put one on myself every time I leave the house, or on the kids when they join me in meditation. But in Tamil slang, "putting a pottu on someone" can signify they have passed away and you're paying your respects to their portrait by putting a pottu on it. So obviously, I woke up dreading the day. Thankfully, it turns out I have no prophetic qualities, and the day passed uneventfully.
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We had our annual Ganesha seek-and-find today (postponed from Friday). The kids found all 32 Ganeshas, showered them with rosewater, anointed them with turmeric and vermillion, and decorated them with flowers. I translated some Sanskrit slokas for them to enjoy, and they insisted on singing "Happy Birthday" in English as well. They heard about our adventure from yesterday, had so many follow-up questions, and were suitably celebratory not to wake up as orphans today.
Pic: The fam at brunch... Big A, Max, At, and Nu with Huckie underfoot. (I'm trying so hard to ignore the giant pile of napkins waiting to be folded behind A.)
We'll be telling this story at dinner parties forever.
Big A and I were on our usual walk to Sparty through the MSU campus when a car careened around the bend and barely screeched to a halt at the stop sign. There were a lot of student-pedestrians around and I have a big mouth on me, so I yelled out, "Slow down!" I guess someone in the car had a big mouth too, because they yelled out, "Boo, Bitch!" This upset Big A who took off running after their car, and they sped off.
Except they looped around and screeched to a halt next to us again. And three of them (two of them sans shirts) got out of the car. As they got closer: Big A asked for an apology; I told them they were going to hurt someone if they didn't slow down; they accused us of looking at them (which we had been). Then the older guy in his twenties said he was going to get his gun, and... reached between the car seats, got his gun, and tucked it into the waistband of his shorts. I thought I was going to burst into giggles at that point, because this very white guy with a gun kept advancing on Big A, liberally using the N-word, and telling him to get "stepping to it." And then everyone was just staring at each other--we didn't want to get shot, and they didn't want to shoot us, I guess? We told them it wasn't right, I threw in a final instruction to slow down for good measure, we said we were walking away, and so we did.
They took off in the opposite direction... but then they looped around again and pulled up about ten feet ahead of us. That's when I pulled out my phone and called 911. And they took off again, this time for real, when they saw me dialing. And we never saw them again. But we did have to wait for campus police to show up and make a formal report. And then we stayed on the lookout on our way home and snuck our way through the woods just in case their car was still around somewhere, laughing with the adrenalin of it all.
Big A is nice because, I asked, and he said that I hadn't escalated when I yelled at them to slow down--I was doing the right thing and speaking up. I am not so nice, because I told him that I didn't need my honor protected just because some rando called me a bitch, and that he should not have escalated by running after them yelling "What did you call my wife?" etc. Anyway, it was an unlooked-for Saturday adventure.
Pic: Brilliant sky, brilliant Red Cedar--the view from the bridge shortly before it all went down.Pic 1: Our travel class is called "The Empire Writes Back: Adventures in Cosmopolitan England" and is obviously based on theories ...
