Sunshine, Shadows and Idyacy

All good here. Some glitches now and then. But mainly good.

However, I learned a few days ago (sadly), that a former neighbor voted tRump as the lesser of two evils, and is apparently still unaware that pizzagate was debunked long ago. I find this very depressing. Neighbor urged me to watch two YouTube pizzagate links, and in a spirit of openness, I decided to watch most of one, but disgust took over. What is wrong with the minds that come up with this and other such sick conspiracy theories? How can anyone actually  believe this stuff? 

It’s that kind of mindset that pushes me towards total intellectual snobbery (!_!), or (positively) one who now grasps why the rural male (and female) not-college-educated voter block is so undiscerning. A lie is a lie is a lie after all! People, today especially, absolutely need critical thinking skills and college can help develop that, for sure. 

Oh well, everyday life as we know it will go on for awhile I hope, but the dangers of tRumpian lunacy and amnesia and ignorance of history will keep feeding into and sabotaging our American  democracy. And that is exactly what Putin (and also Bannon) sought: undermine American values and traditions and erode truth and freedom in every possible way. Chaos, division, ignorance, bigotry and tRump are the tools. So sad. And yet the rise of radical right extremist leaders in the world is a fact. If only all that negative energy and bigotry and greed was directed at attacking the largely economic root cause of failed states! The cause of mass migrations seems ignored. The cause of poverty, violence, war seems ignored.  It ain’t rocket science! Greed rules too often, so life is cheap. Wars in Syria and Yemen endlessly support autocratic regimes and greed-is-good political alliances. Freedom is moved off the chessboard. Truth gets in the way, so it has to be dismembered, dissolved and denied. 

Where have all the flowers gone? Can we still find them and some sunshine? At least now and then, here and there? Can we hope for some needed measure of time to salvage a few more warm, peaceful mornings for another cup of coffee on that lovely deck of democracy before some idyat escaping from the icy 9th circle of hell owns us?

Yes, probably, because that promising big wave tells me: “Surf’s Up!”

NB: Apologies, and no offense intended to my good and generous former neighbor, and to my other friends and relatives of similar mind. Though I cannot fathom nor tolerate the plague visited upon us in the last few years, the dangers posed require alertness and resistance. The blatant corruption and constitutional crisis we face are NOT NORMAL. They are actually proving life-threatening.

Thinking Thanks

Wish you all a happy thanksgiving as you count your blessings! Here, today, a lovely rain is finally cleaning our smoky air and (after nearly two weeks!) we can again breathe safely outside. 

Thinking of those who have nothing, who have nothing left, opposite those who have no heart to care. This (thinking) seems an imperative today. American democracy dies by a thousand cuts when life is cheap, stupidity is lauded, children are caged, journalists are  butchered, and lawless tyrants reign like a mudslide.

Salut!

Something About Those First Graders!

I do not really remember learning how to read. Someone must have taught me, right?  But I have no recollection of the process.  I do remember sounding out words by syllables, but not by each letter’s sound, which I must have already known. I definitely never forgot the long vowels sounds: a e i o u. But those short vowel sounds are still kind of hazy. Upper case, lower case, telling time, counting, naming the months of the year?  I don’t remember when or how or who taught me all that.

Yes, I had parents and an older brother and I went to kindergarten and then first grade and so on. At home, the only story book I remember was “Black Beauty,” about a horse of that name. Obviously, my mother must have read to me in those days before TV and social media. And my grandma had a few familiar rocking chair lullaby songs. They were familiar because she sang them to me and to generations of her grandchildren and great grandchildren!

  My point is simply that I have pretty much no recollection of my  learning process for some of these basic things, and now that I am tutoring first graders (mostly boys so far) in an after school reading program, I am consciously learning right along with them. My experience of and with little kids is almost nil, so I am being challenged, but also having a fabulously fun time of it!

 I do not doubt that these days, many first-graders know more or less (or maybe a whole lot more)  than their ABC’s.  But I do want to say that I count myself exceptionally lucky every minute I spend with these kids. They wiggle, they run, they giggle, they interrupt, they spin on the chairs, they surprise, they play, and they notice stuff.  When I get unexpected clues about what their minds have processed, I count that a special treat. And I learn to not underestimate their grasp of things or their potential.  Even when pressed, these little boys usually have no idea what they want to be when they grow up. But when pressed, one boy declared he wanted to make pizzas, and that led into a whole new discussion. Another beat me (often) at game of “Hangman” with words: Lamborghini, bug, and think. (He was a third grader!)

So, I have to say: there’s something about those first graders, something amazing and extremely precious: they are without guile. As grown ups, I pray that their every potential will be fully realized with only microscopic loss of innocence. Probably nothing else will matter very much.

[Thankful for Alex, Salvador, Julian, Ismael, Selvin, Alejandro,  Kayler, and Krystal.]