First things first, at a macro level, relatively speaking, life is good.
(But, damn…it is realllllly dark at 6AM.)
Anyway I have plenty of things to be thankful for, things that make me happy this week, things like:
Being back home. ((Saturday)
Lunch with a friend. (Monday)
Beers with a friend. (Thursday)
Kerri coming home with a bag of Take 5s to supplement our Halloween candy stash. (Also Thursday) (They may not last until Halloween.)
Being back home, well, home is ❤️. That’s all and that’s everything.
Lunch. With a friend. Someone I connected with pre-pandemic but haven’t seen in 3D since. And she’s Jewish and hurting with the horror in the Middle East…but didn't want to talk about it. Still we had a conversation about being other than, about how things that have nothing to do with who we are but everything to do with it present fundamental challenges in terms of basic human rights and general safety.
F-cking ridiculous, right?
The beers with now friend, former colleague were great. Someone I connected with on some level at my last employer, though our interactions were infrequent so we weren’t quite friends. But since then, when he comes to town we meet for beers…we catch up. We laugh. It’s awesome. He’s awesome. In general its a reminder to make time in your life for good people, to cultivate relationships across geography and demographics, to seize the opportunity to have a beer and/or a smile any chance you get. You’ll never regret making time to have fun.
Plus, I’m happy that it’s Friday, I’m happy that we decided not to be heroes and turned the heat on (though truth told it stung a little to do that before the pool was offically closed)…I’m happy to be having my sis and bro-in-law for dinner tomorrow night, I’m happy that Natalee Holloway’s family finally found the truth if not justice, and I’m happy to be here with you. As I always am, every week. Even when I’m a bit on the ornery side. Like today.
Beyond that I’m grateful that I found time to take my favorite walk yesterday, on a warm almost-Spring-like day (before heading into another rainy stretch), and in particular am grateful for not pulling a hamstring when that nice driver let me cross the street and I “ran” across as a show of thanks.
See? Plenty of good things.
But at the same time, the world is going to shit.
So I think (as we’re conditioned to do), “Well, it could be worse.”
And yes, it could be worse.
So I start going over the ways in which it could be, like:
That driver let me cross and didn’t run me down.
I didn’t get hit by a meteor.
I have a job.
I have my health. A roof over my head. A car to drive me wherever I need to go.
And I didn’t get raped to death because I’m Catholic.
Wait.
What?
What. The. Actual. F-ck?
What kind of sick f-ck is grateful not to be raped to death because of their religion?
It’s unthinkable. Disgusting. Stomach-turning and gut-wrenching.
And yeah, it’s sick and sickening, but it’s not hyperbolic. It’s real.
That’s the world we live in. People are getting raped to death.
So these relatively relative examples we use of “it could be worse” are total bullshit. Why do we feel compelled to make ourselves feel better because we’re not experiencing someone else’s horror ? The world is full of repulsively unfathomable things, and people are being punished and persecuted, objectified, marginalized, and dehumanized for no remotely f-cking valid reason whatsoever.
It’s revolting. Repugnant.
As I type this I realize the English language doesn’t have words adequate for the condition of the world today.
And yet we take it.
But let me repeat something: We live in a world where people get raped to death.
Full stop.
This isn’t about religion or politics or anything other than basic humanity.
Yesterday, I learned that it’s been 25 years since Matthew Shepard was brutally murdered…also for no remotely f-cking valid reason. The fact that after 25 years of “progress” and “learning” we’re in a place where hate is not just ok but in many cases is protected and celebrated, well, it makes me absolutely sick to my stomach. To put it mildly.
The thing about using “it could be worse” to set your perspective is that it forgets this:
It could be better.
A lot f-cking better.
Why are we so quick to accept that bad things are relatively good because, well, it could be worse?
Are we somehow supposed to accept if not be grateful for shitty stuff because it’s not literal shitty stuff—it’s not like someone dumped the contents of a Porta-Potty on us after all.
Suck it up, Buttercup.
No. F-cking. Way.
The world is on fire.
We’re not powerless to change it.
Closer to home, I have people I love going through all kinds of stuff of different scope and scale, solvable and otherwise, but still…I love them and I am powerless to help them address the actual problem. I can be empathetic. But I can’t carry the weight—I can’t even help them lighten the load.
And that hurts.
A lot.
So yeah. I didn’t (fill in the blank with whatever one in a bazillion tragic situations here), but it’s not all good. There are tiny beautiful things that anchor me…but let’s face it, I am drifting in a f-cking cesspool right now. Most if not all of us are. And if you don’t think you are, wake the f-ck up.
We all need to do more, to do better.
Yet somehow, in some way and on some level, it’s ok.
Love you too.