WHAT A DIFFERENCE FOUR YEARS CAN MAKE

Four years ago, I was marching with a million plus people in DC.  We didn't break any windows, or kill any policeman. We simply wanted to make our voices heard. I think that's what you're supposed to do. Speak your truth, stand up to power, and not be crazy. It was a fantastic day, and made the idea of Trump as being charge a little easier to take. There was solidarity. Like minded individuals. Freedom and hope. 

I had just gotten my first screenwriting gig, and so was able to fly both Lisa and myself out there from Denver. We were both still in shock from that election, that horrible, strange election when the world seemed to turn upside down. Lisa knitted Pussy Hats, and off we went. 

I have never seen so many people in one place. I went to the first US Festival, lived in NYC for over a decade, saw Obama speak in 2008. Nothing compared to that crowd. 

Since then, we have seen so much. So many crazy, scary, maddening events. Charlottesville. George Floyd. A global pandemic. And most recently, the sacking of the Capitol. At times these past four years, I have felt like I was losing my mind. Or in the middle of one of those nightmares where you know you're dreaming but can't wake yourself up.

And then, today, I awoke.

I saw grace and glory and pride and respect front and center. 

I saw Kamala Harris, the first woman ever elected to national office, get sworn in as Vice President. I Lady Gaga and JLo sing songs of love and inspiration. I heard an amazing poet read a breathtaking piece. And I heard Joe Biden give the most happily received political speech in recent memory. 

I saw a new day dawn in the nation's imagination.

As some of you may know, I'm an Eagle Scout. I am a hippie, free thinking liberal commie pinko, but I am also a Boy Scout. I love the flag, American history, and this country. I got all three citizenship merit badges: Citizenship in the Community; Citizenship in the Nation; and Citizenship in the World. And I took them seriously. Sadly, Scouting these days has become politicized and is mostly influenced by the right wing of our world. But at least in my troop, back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, scouting was all about exploring the world, and figuring out your place in it. 

I have a deep love of democracy, inclusiveness, and the politics of the possible.

I was taught to try and be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient,  cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. I don't always manage to be all those things. But I try.

I don't think our last POTUS was any of those things. 

For those who voted for him, all I have to say is: Grab Them by the Pussy.

Lament your loss, but don't forget, he said that. And meant it. 

OK. Maybe that wasn't too friendly. Or courteous or kind. 

But to say I don't think he was and is a foul person with no moral fortitude would make me untrustworthy.

For today's song, I'm sharing a video I took of this woman who was at the Women's March. She was over 90 and a Quaker, and exuded strength and grace. Enjoy.

And as a bonus, here's Copeland's Lincoln Portrait

WHY WE FIGHT

Trying to focus on humanity this morning. The good things. Why we fight kind of things. I find it important to do this, not from time to time but from day to day. We have so many gifts, all of us, and somehow, we find ourselves unable to enjoy them. Sometimes, it's because of economics. When you are two, three, four months behind on your bills, it's hard to wake up an extra hour early and say "time to read poetry out loud while facing the east. Other times, after hearing sirens go off and on throughout a night when there is a curfew in your city for the first time that you can remember, raising your hand to the sky in joy seems odd and too close to being arrested to make that seem like a viable option. Or if you are exhausted from all the social distancing, the worrying about your older friend who isn't wearing a mask anymore because they think it's all over, those worries can invade your mind while you try to meditate. But even so, you have to try. I do, any way. I find that times of strife, of sorrow and hardship, are when art and reflection are most needed, most helpful to a troubled soul. We I am troubled. I think we all are. Even the folks with what look like slightly forced smiles plastered on their faces as they sit outside in restaurants for the first time in months look troubled. These are the times we need to listen to a song straight through without checking our phone once during the song. When we need to open a book a poetry, flip to a random page, and read whatever we come upon out loud to ourselves and whomever is nearby, even if it's just a houseplant. When we should take a walk, with no phone on our person, and not think about turning back until we have found a flower, a tree, and a body of water. We have to, for our sanity. For our survival.

Some might say that right now is not the time for that. That we have bigger fish to fry, larger problems to solve. And that's cool.  I understand that line of thought. I just disagree with it. If we have things to do, we need to be healthy and composed. Centered. Clear on our priorities. And I don't think Tiger King bingeing alone will do the trick. Or eating a lot of fast food. Or drinking oneself to sleep, or getting high, or whatever else you use to escape. Not that we don't need escape. We do. Clearly. We are quite good at that aspect of self care. But we need to have balance with that. We need to stop and take note of where we are, how we are feeling, and why we are feeling that way. Don't we? I do. I have found, from the beginning of this pandemic, that I am best able to function when I do more with my time that just trying to recreate the world before Covid and bemoaning my fate. Don't get me wrong. I bemoan a lot. I find it easy to do. Why has this happened? When will I be able to go to a movie or concert or sports event again? When can I hug my neighbors and friends? What's going to happen? On and on. I'm not saying don't freak out. I'm saying, find time to breathe. To revel in the fact that your are alive. That you can have emotions and thoughts. That you are a human being. Yes, we can be a foolish species, and are capable of the worst things imaginable. But we are also able to create music. To sing. To dance. To dream. Remember that as you watch the news. When you stand in line, six feet from the person in front of you. When you go through the mail and get that "past due" letter. To paraphrase Thornton Wilder, you are a human being, not a chair. The fact that you exist is a miracle.

For me, I write a lot. I do this blog everyday. For myself, mostly. I need to express myself, to consider the world I am living in, which troubles me greatly and can often feel overwhelming. So I get up early, put on the coffee, and try to let some of my worries and hopes, my dreams good and bad, out, so that I can examine them. That's one of the ways I meditate. Some people find gardening helpful. Planting seeds, tending to them, and helping them grow. Whatever it is that gives you joy, do that. Call old friends. Tell a dirty joke. Look at the stars. Do something besides the same old same old. I promise it will help. We have a lot of anger and sorrow right now. This is not new. And it isn't going anywhere. Once this time passes, and it will, another terrible thing will come along. And another. That's part of the deal. Even so, life is beautiful, magic, and worth fighting for. And to get in fighting shape, you need to know what you are fighting for. Life. Love. Joy.

Here's a song. It's The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In from Hair. Dig it.

ANYBODY SLEEPING?

Day 3. I wake up a lot at night now. Sometimes it's because Lisa has woken up. Sometimes it's me. We both just wake up a lot. Bad dreams. Scary thoughts. Sort of like there's a global pandemic or something. Yesterday was... Well, I can't say new normal yet, because nothing seems normal, each day is an odyssey through emotions and memories, phone calls to people I haven't called in forever, rechecking our stocks yet again, chores around the house (mostly cleaning, but also some gardening), checking my phone for some sort of new headlines besides "shit is getting worse", commenting on social media every hour about how we need to freeze mortgages and rents, cover all bills, and so on. And then we went to Lisa's dad's house for some corned beef and cabbage, keeping 6 feet between us at all times. This was the highlight of the day. Well, that, and our daily walk, where the world sort of makes sense.

Oh! I also wrote a one act play for the Quarantine Bake Off. That was fun. Went with having a group of playwrights meeting to read their pages. They break into Coors Field, cook some soup on a camping stove, make home made sanitizer, sing some Air Supply, have a run in with ball park security, and then get down to reading their stuff. And I had good talk with a producer friend about a musical we are working on. And also wrote up a bunch of exercises kids can do for Reel Kids while stuck at home. Vlogs, music videos, short films, all tailored to the current situation. So did get some actual stuff done. Fed the soul. We should all write more. And not comments on social media. I mean plays, stories, poems, songs.

I think that's key. Feeding the soul.

To that end. I thought of a game we can all play. I used to play it back in that other world called the past. Get some friends on a group chat, or in person, or whatever. Find a book of poems. Open to a random page. Have someone read the poem out loud. Discuss. Did this once with Jack Halpin and Christine Goodman and came upon "To My Old Addresses" by Kenneth Koch. It blew us away. I've read that one at a few dinners when it seemed right. A poem that starts sort of silly, then takes a left turn and opens up the world. I'd post it here, but can't find an online version of it, and don't have time to write it up. Maybe soon. Who knows. Maybe that will be today's odyssey.

Although we are most likely going to go up to the mountains before it snows. The mountains don't seem to worry about the virus.

Things that have meaning these days: Nature, music, friends, family, my dog.

Ok. More tomorrow. Love, laugh, learn. I hope your day's odyssey is kind.

Poem I Wrote for Jack

Sometimes, I think my brain is like that scene in Poltergeist when Craig T. Nelson takes the paranormal investigators to the kids room- the one where one of the investigators tells him that he once, on a time lapse video, got a sponge moving several inches- to which Nelson looks extremely unimpressed. Nelson then opens the door to the kids room, the room where Carol Ann disappeared, and the investigators see all sorts of debris flying around the room- books flapping like birds, a kids vinyl LP that connects with a writing compass and impossibly begins to play, a light bulb that flies into the socket of a lamp and turns itself on, and a Hulk doll riding a toy horse like he's a little Teddy Roosevelt on San Juan Hill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=fntf6IpPOVI

That's my brain. All these disparate items, flying in a funky, magic, sort of malevolent vortex, creating crazy-logic that is both amusing and creepy.

Anyhow.

So Halpin me a poem the other day and I sent one back.

Here 'tis:

Could you find me?

Anew, anow,  anonymous

And wondrous and full of daffodils

I walk walk walk to the empty old barn, 

Remnant of times past but not dead, no

Not dead, alive with the imagined ghosts 

In the fragrant Oldewood 

And sword fights on the library sign 

With limbs from the local peach trees –

Falling backwards in the 

BlossomLandTime

Of Slurpee cups and that Book

Of Cryptozoological goodness

The sky is always blue always cloudy

always always always always always

Playing a Van Morrison song

I've never heard and know by heart and I

am there and I am here and we are

the walrus we are the night we are always are

dancing leaping smiling frowning

I have the Sword of Shannarra!

I they we you you you where did it go

where are those peach trees now

where are those mad members of

the secret society of forgotten forms–

the wild ones? 

And we go marching on.  

 

 

 

 

And I quote...

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in our selves, that we are underlings". That's from Julius Caesar, and it's one of my favorite lines from Shakespeare, and also from modern American history. See, Edward R. Murrow used most of that line while talking about McCarthyism. i remember being a young man of 14 or so and seeing some documentary about that, and i was so impressed with the whole thing- Murrow, his style, his gravitas, and his ability to quote Shakespeare like that. How cool that a quote hundreds of years old could be so pertinent to the here and now. For some reason, that moment resonated with me. i wanted to be able to quote things like Murrow did. It was the same admiration i felt for Bobby Kennedy the first time i heard a recording of the impromptu speech he gave the night Martin Luther King died and he quoted Aeschylus. There is something inherently comforting in the idea of human beings from long ago saying things that are still timely today- some sort of implied order to this chaotic world, and whenever i come across those moments of quotation, i feel like less of a quotidian. Sorry, i couldn't resist the alliteration. So, the other night, Stephen Colbert went on this riff about which Shakespearean characters the candidates resembled- and i was in heaven. First, he likened McCain to the Scottish Laird- a man of honor who loses all that is good about himself to achieve power. Then Colbert compared McCain to Prospero- a cranky old man living on an island with a creature that nobody liked (at the mention of the creature, a picture of Lieberman can on the screen). If you want to see the whole thing, go here.
What is most interesting to me, as a writer, is that i take more comfort in pertinent quotes in times of trouble than when things are going well. And right now, what with all that's going on economically, politically, and environmentally, you have to admit things are pretty scary. Yet, old quotes make me feel better. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times". Ah, Yes! Thank you Mr. Dickens! "May you live in interesting times"- oh, damn you old curse. "These are the times that try [peoples] souls." Amen. We need to know that others have been through something similar to what we have gone through- it's comforting. It's human. In fact, it seems to me that what truly gives comfort to most of us in the hard times are the humanities- music, poetry, stories- and of course love. All those material things we have sort of lose their stature- I mean, when you read about the stock market crashing, do you go out and stare at your car and think "boy, it's all right- I've got a hybrid!"? No- it's when you remember something you heard once in a story, or said by someone you loved or looked up to, that you start to feel okay.
Okay, I feel a little rambly right now- what I mean to say is just this- money really can't buy you shit, in the long run. Money is a lie, a made up system for trading stuff that can vanish far quicker than a dream you have in those last minutes of sleep after you've already hit the snooze button. And unlike that dream, which may come back to you from time to time, when money goes- it's gone. Poof.
So, here's your assignment for today- think of some quote- it can be from a song, a movie, a poem- whatever- that somehow relates to you at this very moment in time. Say it out loud. Carry it with you for the day. Share it with someone. And wonder and how great and mysterious it is to be a human being.