I woke up this morning to the news that Toni Morrison has passed away. I was going to say "that the world has lost a truly great writer", but, thank god, she has left us words to savor and to roll around on our tongues and in our minds, and I am grateful. There's a lot I want to say when I can, but for now, I'll let those words speak for themselves.
“Our past is bleak. Our future dim. But I am not reasonable. A
reasonable man adjusts to his environment. An unreasonable man does not.
All progress, therefore, depends on the unreasonable man. I prefer not
to adjust to my environment. I refuse the prison of ‘I’ and choose the
open spaces of ‘we’.” - Toni Morrison, Mouth Full of Blood
Tuesday, August 6, 2019
Monday, August 5, 2019
Sunday, August 4, 2019
Day 24: Baby trees
I don't know if it's all of the rain (actual precipitation!) that we had this year, or if I've just noticed for the first time, but there are baby trees everywhere.
Before going to Bluesapalooza, I mentioned that I managed to get a hike in. I finally was able to go to the Minarets viewpoint by the trail, rather than the road - the last two times I was here, the trail was completely covered with snow. As was the road, come to think of it:
Tilly didn't mind.
But yesterday, there were only small patches of snow, and I was able to be on the trail, hiking under trees. For me, the high Sierra come with a scent memory that is so powerful that whenever we come to the mountains and I stop and close my eyes and inhale, a goofy grin comes over me - it's the scent of sun-warmed pine needles and decomposing granite. There's really nothing else like it in the world.
Back to the baby trees. I first noticed baby oaks on my favorite walk (more on that another time). And then, when we were here in June, we stepped out into a clearing surrounded by Jeffrey pines, and all over the ground, everywhere, there were baby pines, still with their little pine nut seed caps. I don't know if you can see those little brown caps on top of the needles, but that's what they are.
Are there baby trees where you are?
Before going to Bluesapalooza, I mentioned that I managed to get a hike in. I finally was able to go to the Minarets viewpoint by the trail, rather than the road - the last two times I was here, the trail was completely covered with snow. As was the road, come to think of it:
But yesterday, there were only small patches of snow, and I was able to be on the trail, hiking under trees. For me, the high Sierra come with a scent memory that is so powerful that whenever we come to the mountains and I stop and close my eyes and inhale, a goofy grin comes over me - it's the scent of sun-warmed pine needles and decomposing granite. There's really nothing else like it in the world.
Back to the baby trees. I first noticed baby oaks on my favorite walk (more on that another time). And then, when we were here in June, we stepped out into a clearing surrounded by Jeffrey pines, and all over the ground, everywhere, there were baby pines, still with their little pine nut seed caps. I don't know if you can see those little brown caps on top of the needles, but that's what they are.
It's amazing to me - they are so tenacious, so small. I can't quite imagine how they get from this state to their huge, long-lived adult selves. I found myself treading very carefully anytime I stepped off the trail. And coming right behind them is the next year's crop:
Saturday, August 3, 2019
Day 23: Bluesapalooza
Rick and I are up at Mammoth Lakes for this year’s Bluesapalooza. A few observations while I groove to the sounds of Christone “Kingfish” Ingram (fantastic - no way is this guy only 20):
- I am fairly picky about the beer I like
- I strongly prefer beer that is bitter (I usually add “like my soul” about now)
- Read: IPAs
- IPAs tend to be high alcohol
- We are at over 8,000 feet
- I hiked 4 and a half miles this morning, covering 500 vertical feet and ending up at 9,100+ feet
- There are 80 breweries here
- Reminder to self: we will be back tomorrow
- Also: hydrate or diedrate
- Also: bring your knitting next time!
Friday, August 2, 2019
Day 22: Prescriptive grammar is a weird thing
I mull this over quite a lot. People of a certain generation and background (caveat here: I was taught to say them this way, too, but after doing all of my usual mulling, I got over it) tend to produce the following:
I am feeling/doing well.
where I would say:
I am feeling/doing good.
As I said, I've thought about this a lot (this is what I do in my spare time) over the years, and then recently, I heard someone say, several times, "I felt badly about that", and it caught my attention, because I think it's doing the same thing. Before I say why I have changed my ways, think about which of the following you prefer:
I am feeling sad.
I am feeling sadly.
I'm guessing it's the first one, right? Assuming I'm right (I can hear y'all nodding from here), that's because "feel" is what we might call a linking verb (and in the sentences above, "do" is functioning the same way) - that is, a verb that links the subject to the predicate (in this case, the subject is "I", and the predicate is what I'm predicating about "I" which is that I'm feeling sad). It creates an equals sign between "I" and "sad". "Sadly", by contrast, makes the verb "feel" here into an intransitive verb, because "sadly" is an adverb, which modifies the verb and tells us more about the manner of the feeling. In other words, a characteristic of the verbal action of feeling is sad. But this sentence is really saying that sad is a characteristic of me, not of the action of feeling.
So, looking again at the first sentences, and at the newest object of my grammatical mulling ("I felt badly") it's the same situation. In the case of "I'm feeling/doing well", it's a judgment of how good I am at feeling or doing, not a statement about my state of mind. In the case of "I felt badly", the adverb "badly" says something about the verb - I'm not so good at feeling, or I knock things off shelves when I'm feeling for them. But I would argue that we're really trying to say something about me, hence, I felt bad.
Just sayin'.
I am feeling/doing well.
where I would say:
I am feeling/doing good.
As I said, I've thought about this a lot (this is what I do in my spare time) over the years, and then recently, I heard someone say, several times, "I felt badly about that", and it caught my attention, because I think it's doing the same thing. Before I say why I have changed my ways, think about which of the following you prefer:
I am feeling sad.
I am feeling sadly.
I'm guessing it's the first one, right? Assuming I'm right (I can hear y'all nodding from here), that's because "feel" is what we might call a linking verb (and in the sentences above, "do" is functioning the same way) - that is, a verb that links the subject to the predicate (in this case, the subject is "I", and the predicate is what I'm predicating about "I" which is that I'm feeling sad). It creates an equals sign between "I" and "sad". "Sadly", by contrast, makes the verb "feel" here into an intransitive verb, because "sadly" is an adverb, which modifies the verb and tells us more about the manner of the feeling. In other words, a characteristic of the verbal action of feeling is sad. But this sentence is really saying that sad is a characteristic of me, not of the action of feeling.
So, looking again at the first sentences, and at the newest object of my grammatical mulling ("I felt badly") it's the same situation. In the case of "I'm feeling/doing well", it's a judgment of how good I am at feeling or doing, not a statement about my state of mind. In the case of "I felt badly", the adverb "badly" says something about the verb - I'm not so good at feeling, or I knock things off shelves when I'm feeling for them. But I would argue that we're really trying to say something about me, hence, I felt bad.
Just sayin'.
Thursday, August 1, 2019
Day 21: What did they see?
There have been various of my usual sorts of things tumbling about in my mind, capturing the magpie's attention to greater and lesser degrees, over the last few days. I'd been thinking that maybe one of those might come to the forefront today, asking to be written about, when I saw this article, entitled, "Video shows last moments of Dallas man, restrained as officers joked".
And it just seemed like something that needed to be acknowledged.
Because it's not the first time. And, although I wish with all my heart that this next bit weren't so true that it's appallingly easy to type, it won't be the last.
There are so very many things to say about this. Things that acknowledge complexity. But in my mind there's also something very simple here. It's not OK. It's not OK to watch someone die because of something you did to them, while laughing. Ever.
I keep stalling out there and trying to figure out what to say next. I know that what many people say at this point is that police officers sign up for a job that is dangerous, and they respond as they do because of their training and because they're working in dangerous environments. And that many of them - most of them, even - are good people. They'd also say in this case that this man was mentally ill (he is the one who called the police because he was having an episode of his illness), and on drugs. But saying that in this context is sort of like saying that Brock Turner had Olympic prospects. Or that a 16-year-old rape victim should have been told that pressing charges against her rapist would ruin his life. It's really not the point. It privileges the narrative, the perspective, the life, of a person who did something callous and fundamentally inhuman. It turns the victim into the perpetrator, and erases their perspective and humanity from the story.
What I keep coming back to, especially in cases like this, where we're not talking about a split-second reaction, but rather about a prolonged, extended act of callous violence and disregard for the suffering of another human being, is - what did those officers see? Not whom did they see, because it seems to me that they must not - they could not - have been seeing a fellow human being; but rather what did they see? Does mental illness inherently make someone less worthy of consideration as a human being? Does Blackness? I mean, I get that the data are in on that one - for many people, the answer is yes.
And I don't think it's just a matter of, police officers have to make split-second life-or-death decisions, so sometimes they get it wrong (that was certainly not the case here, or in so many other cases). That is, in so many ways, too easy. It not only lets those who actually commit these crimes off the hook, but it lets all of us off the hook. It allows us to refuse to take responsibility for all of the many many narratives floating around that tell us that the mentally ill are somehow less human; that people of color are somehow less human. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, even in a situation where someone poses a danger, it is possible to see them as a human being. And that's why I don't buy the argument that officers need to be able to just act in the face of danger, full stop. Sure they do; but whom do they see as they move towards action? What narratives, life experiences, beliefs inform their vision? We know that people of color, and especially Black men, are seen as larger, older, more dangerous than white men of the same ages and sizes. That's a cultural lens. It's the racist smog we breathe. Put a gun in the hands of someone steeped in that smog, and it's nearly impossible to prevent tragedies.
It's the laughter that makes me ill. What would it take for me to laugh at the dying suffering of any living being? What justifies that distancing of one self from another? What do we have to tell ourselves to make that seem in any way normal; or, worse than normal - understandable, justifiable, something that we support? I do not believe that police work requires inhumanity. I don't buy the narrative that we need tough people to do the tough work - not if our definition of tough people is, people who don't see the spark of humanness in other people. It seems to me that the only people who should be doing that tough work are people who are able to see that. And that we need to provide the support and structure to make that possible.
There is so much more to say here, so much to consider, so many intertwining forces that come together to create these tragedies, again and again. But mostly, my heart cries out: how could they laugh? How can they live with the knowledge that they laughed? What are we doing to ourselves to create a world where that happens?
And it just seemed like something that needed to be acknowledged.
Because it's not the first time. And, although I wish with all my heart that this next bit weren't so true that it's appallingly easy to type, it won't be the last.
There are so very many things to say about this. Things that acknowledge complexity. But in my mind there's also something very simple here. It's not OK. It's not OK to watch someone die because of something you did to them, while laughing. Ever.
I keep stalling out there and trying to figure out what to say next. I know that what many people say at this point is that police officers sign up for a job that is dangerous, and they respond as they do because of their training and because they're working in dangerous environments. And that many of them - most of them, even - are good people. They'd also say in this case that this man was mentally ill (he is the one who called the police because he was having an episode of his illness), and on drugs. But saying that in this context is sort of like saying that Brock Turner had Olympic prospects. Or that a 16-year-old rape victim should have been told that pressing charges against her rapist would ruin his life. It's really not the point. It privileges the narrative, the perspective, the life, of a person who did something callous and fundamentally inhuman. It turns the victim into the perpetrator, and erases their perspective and humanity from the story.
What I keep coming back to, especially in cases like this, where we're not talking about a split-second reaction, but rather about a prolonged, extended act of callous violence and disregard for the suffering of another human being, is - what did those officers see? Not whom did they see, because it seems to me that they must not - they could not - have been seeing a fellow human being; but rather what did they see? Does mental illness inherently make someone less worthy of consideration as a human being? Does Blackness? I mean, I get that the data are in on that one - for many people, the answer is yes.
And I don't think it's just a matter of, police officers have to make split-second life-or-death decisions, so sometimes they get it wrong (that was certainly not the case here, or in so many other cases). That is, in so many ways, too easy. It not only lets those who actually commit these crimes off the hook, but it lets all of us off the hook. It allows us to refuse to take responsibility for all of the many many narratives floating around that tell us that the mentally ill are somehow less human; that people of color are somehow less human. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, even in a situation where someone poses a danger, it is possible to see them as a human being. And that's why I don't buy the argument that officers need to be able to just act in the face of danger, full stop. Sure they do; but whom do they see as they move towards action? What narratives, life experiences, beliefs inform their vision? We know that people of color, and especially Black men, are seen as larger, older, more dangerous than white men of the same ages and sizes. That's a cultural lens. It's the racist smog we breathe. Put a gun in the hands of someone steeped in that smog, and it's nearly impossible to prevent tragedies.
It's the laughter that makes me ill. What would it take for me to laugh at the dying suffering of any living being? What justifies that distancing of one self from another? What do we have to tell ourselves to make that seem in any way normal; or, worse than normal - understandable, justifiable, something that we support? I do not believe that police work requires inhumanity. I don't buy the narrative that we need tough people to do the tough work - not if our definition of tough people is, people who don't see the spark of humanness in other people. It seems to me that the only people who should be doing that tough work are people who are able to see that. And that we need to provide the support and structure to make that possible.
There is so much more to say here, so much to consider, so many intertwining forces that come together to create these tragedies, again and again. But mostly, my heart cries out: how could they laugh? How can they live with the knowledge that they laughed? What are we doing to ourselves to create a world where that happens?
Wednesday, July 31, 2019
Day 20: A place to sit
My view for today's meditation:
When I can, I prefer to sit outside. And there is truly nothing better than sitting near the ocean. Add in a lovely, quiet, bluff-top garden, and I'm in heaven. Today is my dear friend's birthday, and she decided that her celebration should start with some time in quiet beautiful contemplation, followed by lunch and a wander through shops, all with friends. I think it ended up being as much a gift for us, as for her!
I hope your days had a bit of peace and quiet in them, too. Or raucous joy, whichever it is that you most need today. I confess to being rather ecumenical about sources of joy, contentment, and peace.
I hope your days had a bit of peace and quiet in them, too. Or raucous joy, whichever it is that you most need today. I confess to being rather ecumenical about sources of joy, contentment, and peace.
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