"In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer."
"Here is the rule to remember in the future, When anything tempts you to be bitter: not, 'This is a misfortune' but 'To bear this worthily is good fortune.'"
"The world is all a carcass and vanity, The shadow of a shadow, a play and in one word, just nothing."
11.13.24
It's been a week since I rolled over on the cruise ship at 4 a.m. to see how things were going in the swing states, only to sit in the phone's glow in stunned horror at the results. P said she knew the news was bad because she saw me look at my phone, but I didn't wake her up. I just sat there looking out the porthole at the roiling Aegean outside in the darkness. The balance of the dream vacation was inevitably colored by what had happened at home.
This morning I was there again at 3, sneaking a glance at Drudge to read that the staffing of the new cabinet comprises a jaunty mix of lupine and lickspittle. He's doing exactly what he said he'd do; there's not a competent pick in the lot.
So there's that.
I'm not sure if it's just emotional overspray from the election, but nothing feels right or good at this moment, from the country to this space I occupy on this frozen morning in Corning. It's taken its toll on every facet of our time. "We can't let what just happened ruin what's left of our lives," I heard myself say a couple days ago. I've done a lousy job of heeding my own call.
Or maybe things are just bad right now, irrespective of this moment of national madness. The firehose blast of work resumed yesterday. I have a difficult personnel issue to resolve at the farm today. I've been asked to prepare a medical POA for my father and to designate myself as the one to pull the plug, again--I reckon it won't be long now. There's a nagging list of things undone because of the vacation that now demands I find a few moments in my work day to get back on track.
So why in the hell am I sitting here writing this, with so much else to do?
"Life is just one goddamned thing after another." So said my grandfather when things got tough. He was also fond of, "Don't let the bastards get you down." Mom offered that bit of advice probably a dozen times in the low ebbs of my school age years. I guess that gives the impression my family swore a lot, which would have been true of my father, at least back when he could speak, but it really wasn't so for Grandpa and Mom. In fact, their general lack of profanity made the sayings that much more jarring.
I digress.
It'll all be fine, of course. As John McCain used to say, "It's always darkest just before it turns pitch black."
(the image is of the death of Ponsonby at Waterloo. Credit as suggested by the watermark).
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