Friday, February 24, 2023
days go by
Today, Earth has rounded the sun full circle since Putin began his 19th century thrust into Ukraine via 20th century toys of slaughter and waves of Russian boys who slaughter on command like Nazi camp guards, succeeded by more hordes of boys now shoved into being slaughtered, while precisely-aimed missiles target Ukrainian families.
A more policy-oriented attitude is expressed by me tonight at the NYTimes here.
Meanwhile, Earth has its way with Turkish impunity toward building codes and Putin-Assad’s efforts to turn northwest Syria into a concentration camp.
I feel insulted by commercial TV reporters flying into hell for an evening news bit from shivering survivors about how much they grieve and suffer. Men with mics, in clean pressed casuals deserve to be met my tearless, monotonic replies, like merely “I have lost all of my family and everything.” Or “I will live. I have no other choice” (actual responses today on ABC World News).
I get tears easily, watching wakes of unfathomable disaster or military barbarity, partly because my good fortune, our comfortable witnessing, half the planet away, seems obscenely voyeurish. Rescue teams aren’t watching TV in order to appreciate the horror. Viewers aren’t the U.N. desperately trying to find ways into the rubble to provide tents, water, and food for survivors facing freezing temperatures at night. Viewers are consumers of tragedy, tourists of ruin.
In recent months, in the middle of my work completely unrelated to any of that (no recall of it, at that momet; no thoughts about it) tears happen ex nihilo. Just there, as if non-conscious Self grieves for local homelessness and senseless crimes of petty predation—or storms causing a tree to fall on a car in motion, killing occupants; or storm-caused power outages leaving others in winter cold for days, like a tiny sampling of life in Ukraine or southern Turkey every day and night
I’ve been spared: no victimization, no harm, no illness.
From our comfort zones, we can ensure that we do work that matters, that we use free time well, exemplify genuineness with nearby others, be walking oases of neighborliness, and live for values that override dismay and betrayal and loss.
Take care, be care, by virtue of being.
