Hypocrisy?

Maybe you’re thinking that if one person holds both of these beliefs, they're being hypocritical:

(1) “Women should have choice about their own bodies”
(2) “People should be required to get a vaccine.”

One statement advocates for personal choice and the other advocates against it.

But keep in mind that not getting a vaccine puts people near you at risk - you could have an asymptomatic case of COVID, they could catch it, and they'll have a slim but non-zero risk of death. But getting an abortion affects one person: the woman getting an abortion.

To me, the real hypocrisy is between the ideas that:

(1) An embryo the size of a grain of rice (i.e. 6 weeks after conception, I'm looking at YOU, Texas) deserves the same protection as a human being, and 

(2) It's "giving undeserving people free stuff" to provide a safety net for babies, children and adults.

It’s a shame that people need mandates to make them do things that should come naturally from their kindness towards their fellow humans.

Dances with Death

Somewhere inside me, the distaste for Florida has increased. I have complained about several things, including the danger I faced on my bicycle, the dearth of pretty views in this flat landscape, the relentless heat. There is also this feeling of “not home” – I miss my old neighborhoods and the friends and family nearby.

But I have come to realize that there is another, more sinister problem about living in Florida. Let me explain.

In 2017, I left a technology career in the New York area. Having been laid off at age 65 it seemed unlikely that I could find another job at a comparable salary. New York is an expensive place to live, so what to do? We came to Florida, where we could afford to live comfortably on a smaller budget. Deb had friends and family here but not in other places we could potentially afford, so Florida seemed like a rational destination.

Florida is known for its many retirement communities. People come down here to enjoy the last few years of their lives in sunshine among friends in similar circumstances. Many “snowbirds” start with a sort of “pied-à-terre” away from the harsh winters up north, and eventually stay here full time. It’s known as the place where old people come to die. (Is that from Robert Klein? George Carlin?)

Since we have been here, we have made new friends in our community. But we have also lost a close friend, and have lost several friends and acquaintances in the neighborhood, to cancer and other causes. We probably will “lose” some snowbird family members due to the difficulties of traveling while old. COVID has also prevented one of the activities that could have made these things more endurable, or at least escapable: travel.

So the problem here in Florida is that we are surrounded by death. Hardly a day goes by when we don’t learn about someone falling ill, whether suddenly or at the beginning of a long decline. They say, “No-one gets out alive” – but must we continually be reminded? There’s even a community down here named, “Journey’s End.”

It might be a good thing to be reminded, often, to live each moment in the present and to live each day as if it were your last. But in view of my current health situation, what good will that do me? There is not enough time, and I have too many regrets.

I am dancing with death, moving closer, then further away, twisting and squirming like Elaine on Seinfeld. I know the music will end, the dancing will stop. I don’t know when, but it won’t be very long.

I had a dream once, in which Deb, Ronni, Allison and I had a joyful dance together in another realm. Perhaps it was one of my premonitions. While I’m still on this Earth where each day should be celebrated, I wait for a time without time in a realm where time is meaningless, and only love, joy and kindness matter. And dancing. There should be dancing.

Originally posted Dec. 20, 2018 in FaceBlech.

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I’m old enough now to have begun “living the dream” and moved to sunny Florida, where I no longer have to shovel, rake, or mow. Every time I take a drive around here I pass dozens of gated communities. Each community has a name. When you tell someone where you live, you often give them the name of your community along with your actual address. I laugh when I see the names of some of them. Others leave me scratching my head in confusion. For example:

* Timber Creek, which has neither timber nor a creek anywhere nearby.

* Isles of Boca, which is, of course, completely landlocked.

* Harbour Green, consisting of concrete and houses nowhere near a harbor.

* Tides at Newport Bay, which is miles from the ocean so it’s not YET subject to tides - wait about 20 years, they say.

* Sherwood Forest - you mean Robin Hood has a condo?

* Coral Trace, in which surely there is no trace of coral anywhere except maybe as an end-table decoration.

* Whisper Trace, probably the nearest thing to “it’s not really there”. And what’s with all these “traces” anyway?

* Broken Sound — I’m concerned. Was this named for staccato gunshots? Or a body of water that has failed in some way?

* Isles at Hunter’s Run, where there have been no hunters for decades, no isles, and a low probability that any of the senior residents do any running.

* Hammock Reserve, evidently a place set aside to grow tree-borne beds.

* Snow Hill - are you kidding me?? This is Florida, remember?

* Mill Lake, where there never was a mill, and the so-called lake is a three foot deep pond.

* Waters Edge, which is, of course, at the edge of a five-foot-wide flood-control channel.

* Central Park: unhappy with living in Florida, they named the community nostalgically.

* Forest Hills - no forest, and flat as a kitchen counter. Also nostalgia-based.

* Patch Reef - is that a command?

* Waters Bend North, Waters Bend East - I guess it depends which way you’re looking.

One community is named Patios on the Park. To me this is nearest to the truth because nearly everyone has either a golf course or park to look at from the patio. Another is named Ashland, which is possibly another nostalgic reference, to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Flushing Meadow.

Now, why are so many communities named “Pointe” (pwant? pointy?)? The word “Point” is too unpretentious, I guess.

One developer here in South Florida has created a bunch of projects each named Valencia-something: Palms, Isles, Lakes, Cove, Reserve, Preserve... We seniors have enough memory problems already, and thanks to these names, I don’t know where some of my friends actually live.

But my all-time favorite community name is Journey’s End. Finally some truth in advertising: Florida is where you come to get old and die.

I used to live on Long Island, NY, in a community called East Northport, which was east of South Huntington. I had friends in West Islip, which was north of Islip. So apparently I have exchanged one kind of brain-bending name silliness for another.

Thoughts About Humans

What a pickle we are in, as a country and even as a species.

Our parents taught us that there are two sides to every story. They were wrong.   If only we could all deeply comprehend the concept that life is not win/lose and zero-sum.

There can be many “sides” to a story. In a formal debate (as opposed to the political shows we see in every election season) one “side” is declared the winner by a jury/audience. In American politics, just like in most sports, there are two sides and when the “game” ends there is one winner.

In contrast, when a group has a discussion, many opinions can be exchanged, and there is no winner or loser - everyone wins for having learned something.

Making policy should be the result of a discussion, not a debate or a game. Why is it a game in the American system?

Is it because our system reflects the game-based, winner-loser society we live in? 

In our broader set of social norms, everywhere there are winners and losers. Success and failure is measured by power and wealth.

But (reaching back to old maxims) if we are “all in this together” and “we’re all children of God” and “nobody gets out alive” then why must we think of some people as winners and others as losers? Why do we see things as black vs. white, have vs. have-not, workers vs. lazy, other vs. us? Granted that “good” and “bad” DO exist, why is it that, once we’ve made these distinctions, those who fall on the wrong “side” stop deserving our support, love and respect?

I guess these are questions that we humans have been asking for millenia. Finding answers has been the starting point of most religions. I don’t, of course, have The Answers. They might reside in the way we have evolved, or perhaps in the way we have been taught. Or both.

But we are more than a collection of cooperating cells. Our ability to understand ourselves and our fellow Travelers distinguishes us from all other species. If we could put more thought into that sympathetic and empathic part of our souls, this planet, this realm would be a happier place.

Am I lazy and a loser for thinking this way? Perhaps. Shall we discuss?

Incitement, Insurrection, Impeachment

I spent some time today watching Impeachment #2. Below I have tried to describe what happened neutrally, without inflammatory words and without bias, despite my outrage. This exercise is intended to to help me vent, calm down, and dissect the January 6 incident. It is not intended to provoke argument, or in fact, any discussion at all. So be aware that it's my blog, I'll be deleting any comments that aggravate me. Feel free to post your own summary, opinions, questions, etc. on your own blog, or on Farcebook.

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The problem: people were led to believe that "This is a rigged election" (Trump, August 24, 2020). Certain TV, radio and print outlets consistently and firmly amplified and expanded this message, stating that early and absentee voting was invalid, that voting machines were hacked, and that votes for Biden were "dumped" into the voting system overnight. So with the help of those media sources, the groundwork for disbelieving the election results, no matter what they were, was in place.

By the weekend after Election Day virtually all the votes were counted (and in some cases, recounted), and Biden had won. But Trump and his supporters still believed the election was stolen from Trump, who then proceeded to use all legal recourse to try to fix the problem. For the next several weeks, in about 60 cases that were brought by his legal team:

• Widespread fraud was neither alleged nor evidenced,
• Most cases were dismissed for reasons that might be called "technical", e.g. lack of standing to sue, or (in PA) waiting many months to dispute the legality of the absentee voting process,
• No court supported the assertion that the election was rigged.

The fact that 60 court cases found no widespread problems did nothing to change the minds of those who had been convinced in advance that the election would be fraudulent. Trump and certain media continued to say that Trump had won. In time they went further, saying that it was actually a Trump landslide, and that the election should be reversed. The Electoral College processes of certifying each state's vote count should be reversed by State Governors, and (later) Congress' certification of the overall result should be blocked.

If you believed that Trump actually won, and that the election process was subverted, your next move might have depended on the degree of passion you had developed. Some people in the public sphere promoted and harnessed this passion, including Trump. 

A large crowd from all over the country assembled on January 6, organized by Trump's tweets and by other people who were convinced that "the election was rigged". They gathered in front of a podium and screen near the Capitol, where the last step in preparing to inaugurate the new President was about to occur. Here they were urged to "fight for their country" by Trump and several other speakers, and watched a video supporting the patriotic nature of the crowd's genesis. Then the crowd walked to the Capitol. 

Here is where things went south. If you sincerely believed that the November 3 election was fraudulent, that your country's government was in danger of being taken over by bad actors, and that there was a way to stop all that from happening, what would you do?

Some of the angrier participants entered the Capitol violently and tried to find the Congresspeople responsible for finalizing the election results. We don't know what those participants would have done if they had found the Congress members, but many were shouting things like, "Hang Pence", and a few were carrying plastic zip-ties of the sort that would normally be used to detain criminals.

Many people were injured, some severely, and a few were killed during the incident. We don't yet know the full story concerning Law Enforcement intelligence, preparation and response to the unfolding incident, but we do know that they were unarmed and severely outnumbered. They have arrested many people, and more arrests are likely. 

The questions in my head include:

• Was the election fraudulent? There are always some irregularities, but were there enough fraudulent votes to have changed the result?
• Since legal remedies had been exhausted, was “stopping the steal” the only appropriate action? Do LEOs think it was appropriate?
• Does inviting a crowd, speaking to them about "taking back your country", and telling them to go to the Capitol - does that constitute incitement? Does the bigger picture do that?
• At what point should Trump have spoken out against the incident? Did he wait too long?

And a little further afield:

• Why has government become a zero-sum football game? Will we ever go back to discussing consequential issues instead of what enables one "side" to "win"?
• Should the Fairness Doctrine be reinstated and apply to all media? Doesn't that just perpetuate the "us vs. them" zero-sum mindset?
• How do we distinguish between facts and falsehood? How do we agree on a set of facts that the Fairness Doctrine would apply to?  
• Who won the Civil War?

Spitting into the wind

Today’s rant is a note to the unreasonably wealthy:

Many of you earn more in a week than you can possibly spend in your lifetime, and you own so much that all of your descendants for the next four generations will be set for life. 

Do you realize it’s in your own self-interest to “redistribute wealth”? It won’t cause you to live in poverty. On the contrary, it will increase your wealth, because more people will be able to afford to buy the stuff you make, or the services you offer. 

Do you recognize that people who are homeless, or food-poor, or can’t afford healthcare or a shack to live in, won’t be sending you any cash for cell phones, trips to Disney World or birthday gifts for their friends or kids?

Perhaps you could consider voluntarily, constructively redistributing your own wealth? Can you think of ways to help people to live above the level of “just surviving”? 

Maybe, for example, you can pay them a living wage, so they could work ONE job instead of three? With all that spare time, and a little more money, think of all the things they’ll be able to do and buy!

Or maybe you could advocate for separating health care from employment, so if you fire them or they get sick it’s not a death sentence? Dead people don’t spend much, as I understand it.

How about lobbying the government to put a proper “safety net” in place as in nearly all of Western civilization outside the U.S.? Then you can lobby the government to increase your taxes a bit, so that only three generations of your descendants will be set for life instead of four.

Maybe if you reinvested more money into your businesses instead of your own salary, you could justify hiring more people who could then buy your products. You’d be letting your wealth “trickle down” instead of hoarding it. 

In fact, a livable minimum wage, a safety net, and universal health care are just a few of the ways you can redistribute resources.

Think of it as an investment. The money you part with today will come back to you tomorrow.

So it's in your own self interest to do these things. How about it?

Off the Screen

We have endured 5 years of a Media Master. Enough.

Since he announced his candidacy for President, Trump has said or done something every day that makes headlines. I don't think "every day" is an exaggeration. We have not had a break for a very long time.

Now his removal from office is pending. Whether it's by voluntary resignation, invocation of the 25th amendment, impeachment, or the end of his term, he will no longer be President Trump, but will become Former President Trump. He will lose his "bully pulpit" from the White House, and has already lost several media platforms from which he has long dominated discourse.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said on Monday that a House plan to vote this week to impeach President Trump is “ill-advised.” I agree, in that Trump will NOT be convicted with a 2/3 majority in the Senate, and that it will delay Biden's efforts to assemble a new government and pass his legislative measures.

But I also believe that impeachment is a bad idea because it keeps Trump in the limelight. Congressional impeachment hearings will take some time, and you can bet the headlines about Trump's latest statements or actions will continue to dominate throughout that time.

Better to let Trump stop being the primary focus of the media. I'm sure he won't go quietly. I know the so-called Conservative Media (i.e. Fox, OANN, Breitbart, et. al.) will retain their focus. But even there, the new President Biden and his new agenda will take some space away from the Media Master if only for negative coverage.

Let's not give Trump any additional reason to keep our attention. Let him, however unwillingly, fade away.

Comments on "The American Abyss" by Timothy Snyder

The American Abyss

By Timothy Snyder

Jan. 9, 2021

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/magazine/trump-coup.html

Timothy Snyder is the Levin professor of history at Yale University [that bastion of Liberal thought /s]. I have tried to summarize Snyder’s article to some degree, but you should really read the whole thing.

In my opinion, Snyder’s article is premature, stating in effect, with his “milling around” observation, that the coup failed. He should have waited for the next two weeks to play out before publishing.

Some of his most important points, with my changes or comments [in brackets]:

It takes a tremendous amount of work to educate citizens to resist the powerful pull of believing what they already believe, or what others around them believe, or what would make sense of their own previous choices.

Gamers and Breakers:

One group of Republicans is concerned above all with gaming the system to maintain power, taking full advantage of constitutional obscurities, gerrymandering and dark money to win elections with a minority of motivated voters. …

Yet other Republicans saw the situation differently: They might actually break the system and have power without democracy. 

Post-truth is pre-fascism, and Trump has been our post-truth president. When we give up on truth, we concede power to those with the wealth and charisma to create spectacle in its place. Without agreement about some basic facts, citizens cannot form the civil society that would allow them to defend themselves.

[Social media] supercharges the mental habits by which we seek emotional stimulation and comfort, which means losing the distinction between what feels true and what actually is true.

Like historical fascist leaders, Trump has presented himself as the single source of truth. His use of the term “fake news” echoed the Nazi smear Lügenpresse (“lying press”); like the Nazis, he referred to reporters as “enemies of the people.”

Trump told a lie that was dangerously ambitious: that he had won an election that in fact he had lost. This lie was big in every pertinent respect: not as big as “Jews run the world,” but big enough.

To make sense of a world in which the 2020 presidential election was stolen requires distrust not only of reporters and of experts but also of local, state and federal government institutions, from poll workers to elected officials, Homeland Security and all the way to the Supreme Court. It brings with it, of necessity, a conspiracy theory… Trump’s focus on alleged “irregularities” and “contested states” comes down to cities where Black people live and vote. At bottom, the fantasy of fraud is that of a crime committed by Black people against white people.

[Here, I think, is Snyder’s core argument about Gamers and Breakers]:

In the four decades since the election of Ronald Reagan, Republicans have overcome the tension between the gamers and the breakers by governing in opposition to government, or by calling elections a revolution (the Tea Party), or by claiming to oppose elites. The breakers, in this arrangement, provide cover for the gamers, putting forth an ideology that distracts from the basic reality that government under Republicans is not made smaller but simply diverted to serve a handful of interests.

[Trump’s] pre-fascism fell short of fascism: His vision never went further than a mirror. … And he could bring his supporters to Washington and send them on a rampage in the Capitol, but none appeared to have any very clear idea of how this was to work or what their presence would accomplish. It is hard to think of a comparable insurrectionary moment, when a building of great significance was seized, that involved so much milling around.

A joint statement Cruz issued about the senators’ challenge to the vote nicely captured the post-truth aspect of the whole: It never alleged that there was fraud, only that there were allegations of fraud. Allegations of allegations, allegations all the way down. [This is an indirect reference to the "flat earth" theory that “It’s turtles all the way down”]

Republicans in the future, at least breaker candidates for president, will presumably have a Plan A, to win and win, and a Plan B, to lose and win. No fraud is necessary; only allegations that there are allegations of fraud. Truth is to be replaced by spectacle, facts by faith.

America will not survive the big lie just because a liar is separated from power. It will need a thoughtful repluralization of media and a commitment to facts as a public good. … Democracy is not about minimizing the vote nor ignoring it, neither a matter of gaming nor of breaking a system, but of accepting the equality of others, heeding their voices and counting their votes.

Hello again, and Welcome

I'm old. Well, old if 68 is old. I have relatives and friends in their 90s, and THAT's truly old.

This site is intended to replace my Facebook account. There's nothing wrong with this blogspot site except that I haven't used it, so it's bare and sad. As for Facebook, I'm writing this entry two days after the "insurrection" at the Capitol in Washington, DC. That was the most disturbing political event I can recall since the multiple assassinations in the 1960s. Most disturbing to me, however, has been the reaction in some quarters: some people thought it was hilarious, and some people compared the Black Lives Matter "riots" to this mob action. And some people with whom I agree were just as disturbed about it as I was, maybe more so.

I have decided that I am no longer interested in seeing such comments because I react with too much anger, and anger is not something I need in my life right now. I shouldn't be watching and reading the news at all. So I'll spend much less time on Facebook, and I will express my opinions here in this blog. If I react to someone's comment in anger, my action will be to simply delete the comment. It's my stuff, under my control.

So that's the rebirth story of this blog.

When I was in elementary school I wrote an autobiography. I called it "Me, Myself and I: The Three Stooges". I might even have a copy of it to transcribe. But at some point I guess I'll write another autobiography. 

Why? Just before the COVID pandemic disrupted our lives, I found out I had cancer. Pancreatic cancer is one of the toughest to overcome because it is usually diagnosed in Stage IV, where it has already metastasized (reproduced itself in other places besides your pancreas). Mine was at the border between Stage III (local spreading) and Stage IV, at a point where it "might" be surgically removed. After chemo it turned out to be unresectable (can't be sliced out), so I had an intense radiation "trial" instead. We continue to watch for results.

In an ordinary year, between or after treatments I might have travelled to visit all of my grandchildren, done some sightseeing, traveled abroad, and enjoyed the company of friends and family as long as I was able. But 2020 was no ordinary year (duh!) and none of that happened. And I don't know how much time I have left: will the widespread distribution of vaccines soon end the pandemic and allow us all to travel and congregate again? Or will I be gone before I can give and receive the hugs I long for?

So my purpose in writing this blog is to create a sort of autobiography, to let my friends and family in on my thoughts and activities while I'm able to write about them. Call it a legacy of sorts. It's kind of selfish, I know, but it's an outlet for my mind and heart that will survive me, I hope. Don't we all wish that we could live in good health for a longer time? Well, that's not the way life works, so this poor substitute will have to do.

I plan to pull into this blog my most important posts from Facebook and wherever else I have expressed something important to me. And I plan to post here exclusively. Facebook will no longer be a place where I spend much time or energy.

At least that's the plan. Let's see how it goes.

Putsch, Coup, Insurrection, Riot...

Reposted from Facebook. Noose image © Getty Images

Please read the words below and think about them. I'm honestly not interested in anyone's opinion, so don't bother to comment pro or con. (h/t Mitch Reicher)

"In 1923, a fringe, right-wing party in the democratic German Weimar Republic attempted a coup that history remembers as the Beer Hall Putsch. It was amateurish in its execution and quickly crushed by authorities. Democracy was saved...or so it seemed at the time.

The Weimar government's response toward the perpetrators of the coup, however, was timid to say the least. Adolf Hitler, the Nazi Party leader who plotted the putsch, was convicted of treason and served less than a year of his five-year sentence. With Germany reeling from hyperinflation and a shattered economy, Hitler was on his way to becoming the dictator of Germany, the initiator of World War II and the mass murderer of six million Jews in the Holocaust.

Our republic cannot afford to ignore the possibility that January 6 represents the same warning sign of creeping right-wing authoritarianism in our own democracy. Our government must act swiftly by seeking the maximum punishment under the law for all those who smashed their way into the Capitol. This is the moment for resolve, not handwringing. The republic must make clear that it will defend itself from this existential threat."

Original opinion article by Jeff Weaver:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/08/opinions/capitol-attack-beer-hall-putsch-authoritarianism-weaver/index.html

Homage to Allison

December, 2018 Originally on facebook.com

I wrote this homage to Allison before what would have been her 42nd birthday. If it's a little bit self-centered, please forgive. It's part of the process...

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Allison was the first child of my first marriage. I think such a child holds a special place in any parent’s life, and that’s no less true for me.  I’m telling her story to honor her, and to help me heal from her death.

Her conception is lost in the cloud of memory. It happened some time during a period when I was wavering in my commitment to my first wife, Ronni, though I wasn’t at a point where I wanted to take action about it. When I learned that Ronni was pregnant, I felt at first that I was “stuck”. 

One morning during the first few months of Ronni’s pregnancy, I woke up from a dream moaning like a baby. It was such a vivid dream: I was in a cave with a cat on a leash; I felt it was time to leave the cave, but when I moved toward the exit, the cave became narrower, and the cat was scratching my face; it became more and more difficult. But suddenly there was overwhelmingly bright light, and I was moving through the air and crying. That’s when I woke up and realized that I was somehow remembering my own birth, including (as my mother had once told me) my umbilical cord wrapped around my neck and my sharp little fingernails scratching my face.

The realization of what I had just dreamed left me with sudden, deep empathy for the life growing inside Ronni, and for Ronni herself who carried that life. The uncertainty I had felt about our marriage and our upcoming parenthood was suddenly gone. I was excited and warmed with anticipation.

The next months were filled with visits to a natural birthing center in NY City in which we eagerly followed the progress of Allison’s growth and did everything we were told would help her be born healthy and strong. At the last, Ronni’s water broke and the birth process didn’t progress fast enough, so we “risked out” and landed in Lenox Hill Hospital under the care of a doctor rather than a doula. Under the influence of pitocin Allison finally arrived very early in the morning of January 5, 1977.

Thanks to the kindness of the doctor and hospital, rather than bright lights and noise, Allison was greeted by her parents in a softly-lit, warm room. There was no crying (except a little by Ronni and me), just the sounds of Allison, Ronni and me breathing. There were Allison’s huge, bright blue eyes taking it all in, as though she was just as awed as we were by the scene unfolding. I got to cut her umbilical cord, and Allison took her first meal from Ronni’s breast.

Allison was a happy, bright, active child. I remember how hard it was to get her to fall asleep - I think she felt she would miss out on something. Over her pleas of, “No go sweep,” many nights we would rock her to sleep on a pillow on our laps. She learned to play violin in a Suzuki program (a cringe-inducing experience for us, but only at first), and we sent her to a Montessori pre-school where she made friends and thrived.

I remember one day while we were living in an apartment in Queens, NY, when we all walked outside to wait with her for her school bus. I would then have driven to work, but we saw that the car had been stolen, and I said, “Holy shit, the car is gone!” And then there was the sound of Allison shouting, “Holy shit, the car is gone!” over and over for the next several minutes. Sometimes I was not the best example for my child.

I wonder how Allison remembered our trip to Disney World in Florida when she was 7 years old. My favorite memory of that trip is the Space Mountain roller coaster: Allison screamed and cried the whole time, and when we finally got off she said, all in one breath, “That was horrible! Can we go again?”

Ronni and I would have been thrilled to have more kids while Allison was still so young, but by the time she was 8 we had been unsuccessful, so we began an adoption process. Jonathan had been born in Korea in late January of 1985, and his unmarried parents had given him up to foster care; by late Spring we were well on the way toward bringing him home. Allison would finally become a big sister. As has happened with many adoptive parents, while Jon’s adoption was in progress, Ronni became pregnant with Jason. Normally that would have disqualified us from adopting Jon, but we kept Ronni’s pregnancy a secret because we had already fallen in love with Jon. He arrived in September, and Jason arrived in February. We had (and I have) no regrets, although the agency facilitating this adoption changed some of their rules to prevent this ever happening again.

So Allison was a big sister twice over, and both of them were boys. I think there was a little corner of her mind that would have preferred at least one of them be a girl, but that didn’t stop her being the best sister. 

Allison’s violin talent blossomed, as did her aptitude for math and science. She was the co-concertmistress with her BFF, Erica, of her high school orchestra, and was in the top tier of students of her high school. She won a nearly full scholarship to Smith College in Massachusetts, where she double-majored in math and music and finished her senior year as the concertmistress of the college’s orchestra.

After college she lived in our home for awhile but decided to break free and move to Port Jefferson, sharing a house with some roommates. She started working as a temp but soon was asked by Arrow Electronics to become a full-time employee. It’s not a job she liked, but it paid the bills and she liked the people she worked with.

I guess it was mid-2005 when she went on a trip to Italy with Mark. Who? She had met Mark on a group hike, and the attraction was mutual and strong. A few months after they returned, Allison came to visit us alone, prancing around the kitchen helping Mom prep dinner and trying to get her to notice the ring on her finger. It took awhile. Many tears of joy followed.

It was early January of 2006, merely two months later when Ronni, feeling a persistent pain in her side, went to her doctor. Tests showed a cancerous mass at the top of Ronni’s kidney. There were many more tears, clearly not tears of joy this time. The tumor was surgically removed late in January, followed by unceasing rounds of various chemical and radiation therapies. As soon as one spot showed up and was vanquished, another spot would show up elsewhere. Ronni’s fight was relentless. 

During all of this, Allison and Ronni set about preparing for Allison’s wedding, scheduled for September, 2006. Mother and daughter pulled off a beautiful event in a beautiful venue.

I have suspected that Allison wanted her mother to enjoy her daughter’s big life events as quickly as possible, given Ronni’s uncertain prognosis. Our grandson Zachary was born in June, 2007, barely nine months after Allison and Mark’s wedding. Ronni happily became Zach’s nanny when Allison returned to work, though the cancer continued to spread regardless of the various treatments she endured. The year and some after Zachary’s arrival became increasingly bleak. Ronni died at home on the Jewish holiday of mourning, Tisha B’Av, which fell on August 10, 2008.

We must barely have settled into a new routine when, around Thanksgiving, Allison had some tests to investigate some recent digestive issues. She was diagnosed with esophageal cancer that December, 2008, just four months after her Mom’s passing.

The next year was filled with doctors and treatments again, this time for Allison. She, Mark and Zachary moved in with me, where she could get more help from her grandparents as well as me. Among all the medicines and radiation treatments, she maintained a remarkable strength of will, expecting to beat it and start school again with the aim of starting a career. But the treatments took away some cognitive abilities, scuttling her potential success in school, and caused neuropathy which eventually took away Allison’s ability to play violin. 

When the Fall of 2009 came, and it was time for the Jewish Holiday of Rosh Hashanah, Allison was still strong enough and able to attend services. But the following week when Yom Kippur arrived, she sat in a chair and cried bitterly. She said that she could not listen to the part of the service that describes the Almighty as deciding “who shall live and who shall die.” I was unable to speak, and unable to comfort her beyond a hug.

It must have been the end of May when she pointedly asked her doctors how much extra time all of these debilitating treatments were buying her. When she heard, “A few weeks at best,” she told them she’d rather have some more time feeling well, and asked that her treatments stop and home hospice care begin.

The decline was sudden and steep. I don’t think she ever got those hoped-for extra weeks of feeling well. She tried to leave some written notes and stories for Zachary to read after she was gone, a legacy of sorts, but she ran out of energy and time. Towards mid-July she slipped into a coma. We could only give her pain medications and read to her and talk to her. The day after I read the Vidui to her (a traditional Jewish confession usually read at Yom Kippur), I watched from across the room as she suddenly became pale, took one more breath, then stopped. She was gone. 

It was, again, the Jewish holiday of mourning, Tisha B’Av, which fell on July 20, 2010.

I believe the soul persists after one’s death. I believe that Ronni and Allison each spoke to me many times after they died, and left many signs that they were around. I believe that Allison had something to do with the peculiar weather on the day of her funeral: it rained only while we were indoors, and afterwards the rain, outside the front window of her grandparents’ house, dripped off the tree in huge sun-lit goblets that caused me to gasp because they were so beautiful. She had given me a beautiful moment after she passed.

I had seen Allison leave us, taking her very last breath in my presence. Then I remembered that I had seen her take her very first breath as well.

How to Resist The Regime

Posted here: http://stephenking.com/xf/index.php?threads/so-what-will-you-do.12875/page-2 by someone who calls herself "Todash Free spirit. Curly girl. Cookie eater. Proud SJW."  

Echoing her request: if you know the author, please point me to him/her for proper attribution.

I stumbled across this on Facebook this morning. I liked it so much that I cleaned it up and turned it into a post on my social justice blog. I'm just gonna copy the text and paste it here. (If anyone knows who created this, please let me know so that I can properly attribute.)

Some pointers going forward:

1. Don't use his name.
2. Remember this is a regime and he's not acting alone.
3. Do not argue with those who support him—it doesn't work.
4. Focus on his policies, not his orange-ness and small hands.
5. Keep your message positive; he wants the country to be angry and fearful because this is the soil from which his darkest policies will grow.
6. No more helpless/hopeless talk.
7. Support artists and the arts.
8. Be careful not to spread fake news.
9. Take care of yourself; and
10. Resist!

HOW TO RESIST THE FASCISM THAT WE ARE BEGINNING TO EXPERIENCE (and if you don't think that religious tests for immigrants and citizens are fascist, then you do not know the history of Nazi Germany, Stalinist USSR, Franco's Spain, and Mussolini's Italy—as well as fascist Saudi Arabia, etc., etc.) …

These pointers are actually helpful—people have been looking for something; these are a starting point. Some are strategic, like #1 and #2, some are psychological, like #5 and #6. Don't give in to depression and anxiety. Go to #7 instead.

"Make Resistance Great Again"

1. Avoid using his name

Every time you use his name, you make him stronger. He has developed a cult of personality around himself that thrives on your hatred. He wasn't kidding when he tweeted, "I would like to extend my best wishes to all, even the haters and losers, on this special date, September 11th." He really does extend best wishes to you, the hater, because you give him power; you make him seem like something bigger than he really is, and you are the object of hatred that motivates his supporters. You are his Emmanuel Goldstein (1984 reference -- read it if you haven't already).

2. Spread the blame
Don't allow moderate Republicans to hide behind ambiguity and equivocation. They are supporting a President who is trying to destroy our democracy, and are therefore members of a regime, not an administration. If you focus all of your attacks on their leader, you are only reinforcing his message that "I alone can fix [our problems.]". In reality, he requires the support of collaborators. Call it what it is: "the regime."

3. Do not engage the regime's base

Let's do a thought experiment. Imagine your favorite song; hear the music inside your head. Now imagine someone telling you that the song sucks, and you should never listen to it ever again. How likely are you to be swayed? The regime is music to the ears of its most ardent supporters, and you will never convince them otherwise. Remember when their leader said, "we're going to win so much, you're going to be sick and tired of winning"? That statement was meant to appeal to a base of supporters who feel like they're losers, people who get a high from being associated with a "tremendously successful" billionaire. Now try to imagine how good they must have felt when he won the election. Every time you get mad at them and argue with them, you remind them of how good it felt to win. You motivate them to work harder toward their leader's re-election. If you deny them the pleasure of yelling at you, you will make politics less enjoyable for them, and thus more apathetic about the regime. You will never dislike your favorite song, but you might stop listening to it as much as you once did, and this is the best we can hope for with the regime's base.

4. Focus on policies, not personality

Most polls showed the President's favorability rating around 38% on the eve of the election, but 47% ended up voting for him anyway. That means 9% of his voters already think he's an *******, but, nevertheless, an ******* who's going to do a better job than his opponents will. These are the people we need to focus on; if we can convince them that his policies suck just as much as his personality sucks, we are likely to flip their votes. So, stop focusing on the guy's hands. Everyone already knows, and it didn't work during the first time we tried it. Remember Einstein's quote about the definition of insanity.

5. Keep it positive
The regime feeds on negativity. The policies they support are born from fear and anger. People filled with love and optimism generally do not support policies that are centered upon walls, torture, and deportation. This is why the leader of the regime didn't tell a single joke during his convention speech. He wants the country to be angry and fearful because this is the soil from which his darkest policies will grow. Keep it positive, and spread love; it's poison to the regime.

6. Don't spread hopelessness

Whenever you say "we're screwed," you communicate hopelessness. Saying things like, "I don't understand how this happened" is the same as saying, "I don't know what the solution is and you shouldn't listen to anything I propose because I just don't understand." But, you do have hope; otherwise, you wouldn't have read this far. And, you do have a solution—resistance! It's okay to be down and to seek out other like-minded people for comfort, but try to stay focused on spreading hope and confidence. We got this, okay?

7. Make resistance cool and fun

As the country becomes more political, and more polarized, Americans will feel increasingly pressured into choosing a side (sociology happens). We want healthy, positive people to choose the resistance because we ultimately don't want the entire country to end up resembling one of the regime's rallies. Besides, we ARE cool and fun; just look at all the musicians who boycotted the regime's inauguration. The fact that the Resistance is responsible for the generation of almost all of our society's visual and musical culture is one of our strengths; let's maximize it.

8. Stop spreading fake news

Sorry everybody, but we do it too. Do you remember when Trump went on Oprah and said, "if I ever run for president, I'll run as a republican because they're stupid enough to vote for me?" That never happened. And, you know how the regime deleted all the information about LGBT rights from the White House website as soon as it came to power? Actually, the regime deleted almost all information from the White House website, which is a common practice for all incoming presidents—Obama did it too. When we spread fake news, we contribute to the confusion many Americans are feeling right now, thus contributing to the problem. The regime doesn't need everyone to believe its lies; it only needs 1/3 to believe the lies, and another 1/3 to be so confused that they don't even know who to trust anymore. Let's show them that they can trust us—educate yourself on the issues, hold other members of the Resistance accountable, fact check information before you post it, and retract anything you post if it is later proven wrong. Reality still exists, and we are the communicators of that reality.

9. Take care of yourself

The world will not end if you take a break or have fun doing something that's not explicitly political. But, the world will end if the majority of the Resistance ends up too burned out to fight. Just remember—even when you're sleeping or recreating, you're only recharging yourself for more resistance.

10. Resist, resist, resist, and don't apologize for it

Your constant political posts are not annoying; the regime is annoying, and they are the ones who are inciting us to raise our voices.

Mysteries

For years I have puzzled over what the “universe” is trying to tell me, when every other year for the last six years, a family member (close or more distant) dies on Tisha b’Av.  It’s a day when we remember all the tragedies that have happened to the Jewish People.  Was losing Ronni and losing Allison that kind of tragedy? What is the significance of losing Allison’s brother-in-law, Jonathan, on Tisha b’Av two years ago? Is it superstitious of me to be apprehensive, since this is another even-numbered year?

I have no answers to these questions. 

There is still a deep sadness in me that wells up every summer as these anniversaries pass.  It lasts for weeks and weeks, and comes in waves.  I don’t try to suppress the sadness, perhaps out of love and respect for my first love and for my first child, or perhaps because it makes me feel closer to them for a little while.  I try to honor them in little ways, and take the time to think about them. Memories return, some of which make me laugh, and some make me weep.  I will go to synagogue services this year on Tisha b’Av because I feel I belong there.  All of this will temporarily overwhelm the happiness in the other parts of what has become my life.  It’s not that I cannot feel joy or love, it’s that the tears blur those feelings.  I remain deeply wounded and have not fully healed.  Perhaps I never will.

At Allison’s funeral four years ago, our friend Mair came up to me and said, essentially, that she hoped that the “universe” would now stop messing with us and leave us in peace.  From your mouth to G-d’s ear, Mair.  Amen.

Hurt

I'm trying to grab out to bits of my life with Ronni now that a large break is imminent (the move to Queens) and an anniversary is nearby.  I looked up her name on my phone and browsed some of the things that came up, but it just makes me sad. I don't feel very much guilt except perhaps that I don't like the fact that I'm so self-absorbed about it.  It hurts, but imagine how she hurt.  I still have my life here, and look how much she missed.  Look how much pain she endured before she left, and how much pleasure she lost after she left.  I used to think she could see the world through my eyes, and that it was my responsibility to her in the afterlife to see the things she was missing, really see them and feel them, so that she would, too.  Now I don't know.  I don't know what I believe any more.  All I know is how sad I am, and how easy it would be to give in and start bawling like a baby right now.  

Now look at the pain others have suffered, and know that it's part of everyone's life.  Look at Deb's friend who discovered she had colon cancer 3/4 through her pregnancy.  Look at the two hundred families described in that article I read yesterday, who lost loved ones in a plane crash which was so violent that people's bodies were ripped from their bones.  Look at the one who might be about to lose his wife to God-knows-what, and who will be totally lost without her.  I was lost without Ronni for quite awhile.  What carried me through?  Maybe finding a sense of purpose, a mission to focus on - Allison.  And then when the mission ultimately failed, and I had to figure out how to go on, how did I do it?  Another mission, perhaps, in Zachary, as a responsibility handed to me by Allison.  And that mission failed as well, didn't it?  None of this was in my control, so there is no need for the guilt of failure.  But the sadness of loss is here, deep and persistent.  Don't try to shake it, it cannot be avoided.  As always, I have to go through it, not back away or go around it. The pain will subside, and it will come back later, a little softer.  But allow it to hurt if it must.  Because it must.

A tear is running down my left cheek.  I wiped it away but another will replace it.  Life will go on for all of us. The pain will remain.

Loss

I suppose it was a sign: as I reached for a screwdriver from my desk drawer, out fell a small strip of ribbon with two hearts imprinted on it.  I had found this ribbon while I was finishing cleaning out the house so Allison and family could move in; now she and Ronni were signaling their presence and support.

I had been thinking to go to the cemetery.  After a happy, peaceful week in Atlanta with Deb, where we visited family on both sides and where I restarted walking for exercise and weight-loss, circumstance made me go back to 15 Wicks alone. There are many memories here, both good and bad, but when I am alone sometimes the bad ones overwhelm me.  I need to give in and have a good cry.

Last night I had too much to do, and by the time I might have gone to their graves it was too dark.  I went to sleep thinking I would rise early and visit them.  But this morning I had too much sleep to catch up on and got a late start.

Debra understands my periods of sadness more than anyone.  After talking with her I took her advice and went to the cemetery this evening instead of waiting till tomorrow morning.

For years I have been aware of what I call a "saw-tooth curve" in my emotions about Ronni and Allison.  After some time being able to function quite normally and comfortably, a deep sadness rises in me that I eventually cannot set aside.  The only cure I have found is to allow myself to grieve deeply, to cry long and deep.  Afterwards I can return to life in the present tense.  When Ronni died, and again when Allison died, the period of the curve was measured in hours or days. During 2009 and 2011 it lengthened, and having been laid off in 2011 I had time to go through my grieving as often and as long as necessary. In 2012 I started working again, and met Deb, and got married -- and the sadness returned only intermittently. But here I was, alone at 15 Wicks, nearing the peak of that saw-tooth curve.

So tonight after testing my bicycle (passed) and my legs (failed) with a ride to Sheila and Al, I drove to Mt. Golda Cemetery, placed a couple of stones on their monuments, and sat between the two markers.  And I cried.  I cried more deeply than I have cried for many months, in waves and in sobs.  And yet, I felt little relief, so I stayed and thought some more, and cried a little more.

And the third wave of sobbing brought new thoughts:  for years I have been crying for myself, for what I have lost.  This time I cried for what Allison had lost, and what Ronni had lost.  I have been privileged to attend the weddings of my two sons and my nephew, and my niece's Bat Mitzvah. I have seen two more grandchildren come into the world, and a third is on its way.  All of this (except Jason's wedding which Allison attended) and so much more was missed by both Ronni and Allison because their lives were cut short.  I wept bitterly for them, for the joy they did not get to experience.  And I wept thinking about how different Zachary might have been, how different we all might have been, had the Big C not taken them.

I recognized that my grief had changed character -- it was somehow less about my loss than about theirs and that of everyone around me.  The world is poorer for their absence.

As I pondered all of this I remembered when Allison and Ronni came with me to the hospital when my mother had just died, near the end of April in 2004.  We came back to 15 Wicks and I sat on the couch in the living room and completely lost it.  I had been holding it in, I suppose, for months while my mother was becoming weaker and approaching death, and now the finality of it hit me.  It was time to grieve, and I asked out loud, "I guess it's OK to cry now, right?" and burst into sobs.  What I remembered today was how Allison and Ronni sat alongside me on that couch and hugged me until I had finished crying.  As I sat between their two monuments, I felt those hugs again.  I wept once more and finally felt some relief.

This is not the last time I will cry over them.  But my sadness has that new element of recognition, that the loss was theirs and ours as much as mine, if not more so.

As I looked up from my tears I was facing north.  A storm is coming in from the south, and the sun was setting behind the clouds, but in front of me there was enough open sky that the sun lit the bottom of the clouds in a soft rose hue.  I took it as another sign, another hug.  And I drove home determined to capture these moments for myself and for everyone who loved Allison and Ronni as I did.

Blessings

Haven't posted in awhile.  I have deliberated about whether or not a chronology is appropriate here, and I have decided that so much has happened that I can organize my thoughts in no other meaningful way but time order.

I read somewhere recently that you never stop grieving from a serious loss; you only make space for it in your life.

Since that September walk along the beach at Robert Moses, my life has gradually and sometimes suddenly changed for the better. It remains true that I can burst into tears in a second, but other, more sanguine truths have filled my life so that those bitter moments are rarer, and softer.

Perhaps the rainbows and the sunset at the Robert Moses Beach marked a place and time where I turned a corner.  Not long afterwards I began thinking about "what to do after the money runs out" at the end of February, 2012, when my Dowling severance package would end.  I took some positive steps:  started writing my resume in hopes of getting a job; bought some "interview suits," shirts and ties; began spending more time learning about things that interested me, both in technology and elsewhere.  I joined a couple of hiking groups and biking groups, and went on hikes in groups as well as alone. (I stopped biking because it was cold and because my back was hurting from a fall.)  In retrospect, I think I was starting to come out of the fog that my grief had created. I even made a furtive, though ultimately unsuccessful, attempt at getting friendly with a woman I met at a traffic jam in Huntington.

I have talked about my belief that the Universe (or God) seems to provide what I need. I wanted to win the lottery, but instead He gave me a job:  I was asked by a former colleague, whom I consider a friend as well, to join his staff in a technology company named Vicom, in Farmingdale. The job utilizes my skills and enables me to enhance them, and is stocked with warm, intelligent people. I feel that it's a great fit, and since the first of January I have been enjoying work much more than I had been able to enjoy it at Dowling in the last few years.

So the "money runs out" problem went away, and in fact, there was some overlap with my Dowling "paychecks" such that I was able to pay most of my debt (except mortgage) down to zero.  Truly remarkable.

It's not that there haven't been bumps along the way.  In February I landed in Huntington Hospital for a few days with an irregular heartbeat.  I wore a heart monitor for a month so the doctors could figure out the right dosage of medicine to reduce the problem. I have joined the ranks of those taking medicinal maintenance doses for the foreseeable future.  But from all the tests I learned that I have very little blockage in any of my heart blood vessels, and a cholesterol level that's "close enough" to be regulated by diet and exercise.  Oatmeal, cheerios and long walks in the woods, those are my friends.

In March, having talked with me about the various scenarios with Raquel and Zachary, Mark decided to move back to Yorktown.  It took him only a few weeks to gather everything together and cram it into his family's house up there, though it has taken him months since then to gradually empty the house of unneeded stuff.

For me, this was a major negative.  Allison had frequently expressed a desire for me to remain close to Zach, but that's not possible when he is 100 miles away.  By May we had started to find a weekend routine where either Mark would bring Zach to me or I would go upstate.  But the house here in East Northport was cold and silent, and it amplified my grief.  Early and mid-May were unhappy times for me, as the reality of their leaving set in:  it was Spring again and life was blooming outside my window, but not in my house, nor in my heart.

Cue the dramatic music.

Around Memorial Day Bonnie (sister-in-law, Ronni's brother Mike's wife) posted a link to a Joe Biden speech to the families of deceased veterans. She urged that we read to the end, where I found this quote: "There will come a day – I promise you, and your parents as well – when the thought of your son or daughter, or your husband or wife, brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye. It will happen." An old school friend of Bonnie's, Debra Davidson, had thanked her for posting, and I posted subsequently: "'It will happen.' It already has. Doesn't make it easier or better. I just keep putting one foot in front of the other... Thank you for posting this."

Curious, Debra found my blog and private-messaged me, and we started a conversation on Facebook that lasted through two days and many long paragraphs of deeply personal thoughts.  We agreed to chat by phone, which lasted three hours the first night and almost six hours the second.  The part of our conversations that I remember most clearly was when she choked up about how she felt things had gone wrong in her life and how she wasn't going to have a deep, strong, life-long relationship of the kind I had with Ronni.  I felt I already knew her well, and felt already that SOME kind of relationship with Deb would be a good and happy thing.  Later she told me that she felt that almost anyone else would have said a quick, embarrassed good-bye at the first sign of her tears, and that she felt very close to me as I stayed on the phone with her and tried to comfort her.

We met in person two nights later.  We have been nearly inseparable ever since. She spent most of July in East Northport while her son, Ethan, was away, then the two of them spent the rest of the summer at my house until Ethan went back to school.  Since then I have spent most weekends at her apartment and weekdays commuting from home to work.  It's a routine we will endure until I sell the house.  Once she gets a job we'll be able to decide on a good location, probably outside Manhattan, where the three of us can move together.

So we thought about when to get married.  Just a few weeks after we met we kinda knew it would happen, but there have been too many unknowns until now so we just kept talking and working out the kinks.  A couple of weeks ago we bought Deb an engagement ring.  Done!  We don't fool around.  Between her interviews and job prospecting Deb has been working on the wedding, which is scheduled for December 2 in the home of her best friend who lives near her in NYC.  It won't be a big, extravagant, elaborate wedding.  But we will do what it takes to make it special for both of us.  Why wait?  As Ethan said, "At your age you shouldn't wait."

Why did all of this happen? Because:

(1) I was ready.  A week or two earlier while I was in the doldrums, it wouldn't have happened.  Several months earlier and my priorities would have been elsewhere, on Zachary, or on getting settled at work.  It was just the right time.

(2) The Universe intervened. The odds of two people coming together like this on Facebook seem to me to be astronomical.  Deb connected with Bonnie through Facebook only last year, and they were not in frequent contact even after they friended each other. And how likely is it that someone sees my "thank you for posting this" and is both motivated AND capable to dig deeper? Deb has made her living doing research, and her knowledge and experience happened to lead her to me. What are the odds???

(3) We were made for each other.  Despite major differences in our paths through life, we seem to think alike, and we have so many things to talk about that, even if the romance wasn't there, we would have become great friends.  The romance is a wonderful surprise bonus to this "us" that has arisen.

I know that Ronni wanted me to find a way to be happy in the remainder of my life without her.  She told me so herself.  I have taken a four year journey through sadness and despair, to return to joy.  I know that Ronni is happy for me now. I feel so grateful for the wonderful things that have happened in-between the bad things: the weddings, the achievements, the grandchildren... I owe an immeasurable debt of gratitude to all of my family and friends who stood by me and held my hand.  I only hope I can give back a little of myself to them and to Debra so that they feel as loved as I do.

So many people live their whole lives without having found true love. Somehow, in my life, I have found it twice. I am so blessed.