Waiting

I'm anxiously anticipating the returns for November 3rd. I will vote and thereby follow closely the election results.

I am hopeful.

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The Date Coming Up

I am earnestly waiting for November 3rd. A recent opinion piece by The New York Times writer, Nicholas Kristof, summed it up well for a lot of us, "Everything We Love Is on the Line."

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A Great Day Coming, Hopefully

I am looking forward to the midterms. I think much good for our society will come from it.

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Spirituality

I've been spending more time reading about nondenominational spirituality. Something I would have called, possibly, "liberal gibberish" many years back when I was a Christian fundamentalist.

The book I'm reading is called Spirituality: What It Is and Why It Matters, by Roger S. Gottlieb, a Professor of Philosophy at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. It's a delightful book that argues cogently for spirituality rather than religion. I have become more on this side of the issue for about the last five years because I am seeing things about religion that I didn't see thirty, or even ten, years ago.

Religion has done a number of great things in our world, yet, also many horrible things. The issue I have is religious people will assent to the good things, but most will not admit to the bad things. That's not good.

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Rest

Today I've tried to relax more than usual. "Relaxing" seems to be a concept between work and rest. And sometimes understanding the notions of work and rest are hard enough.

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Thinking Out Loud

I'm still mentally centered politically. I am optimistic on the midterm elections coming in November. Our president seems hellbent on doing things his way and, thereby, we may as a society, see what the ancient Greeks talked about, when they talked about hubris.

We shall see.

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Still on Politics

My mind is still centered on the topic above. I do feel hope that our society will get better because of what can happen in about six weeks, with the midterm elections.

If our president continues to do what's he's been doing, there is much hope.

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Wilder and Wilderest Comments

I came across comments from Louisiana politicians recently. They were so outrageous, I thought I would quote them.

Speaker Mike Johnson: "Next year the communists will be in Congress--that's what's so frightening." 

Representative Steve Scalise (the No. 2 House Republican): "There's been a Bolshevik Revolution in the Democratic Party."

Here are some other comments made by Mike Johnson.

Mike Johnson once said the No Kings protests represented "a rise of Marxism in the Democratic Party." He said the protests sent out "hateful messages" to the nation. And he said the No Kings protests are a "dangerous ideology, and it's anti-American. It goes against everything that we stand for."

That's heavy stuff.

I presume the comments will get wilder as we get closer to November 3rd.

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Just Looking

As I'm observing the political landscape, I do feel some levity. More than in the recent past. I think the Trump phenomenon will start to break down substantially after the midterm elections. Like after the Gilded Age and the Great Depression, where society was crumbling, there was new life brought about because of the New Deal.

Yet, I do realize they are not comparable societies. But we can still hope.

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Some More Quotes

 --We firmly believe that therapy is education rather than healing; that it is growth rather than treatment.  Arnold Lazarus and Alan Fay

--He that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent.  Proverbs 28:20

--Patience and passage of time do more than strength and fury.  Jean de la Fontaine

--The more haste, the less speed.   John Heywood

--Injustice never rules forever.   Seneca

--Charity is no substitute for justice withheld.   St. Augustine

--A hungry man is not a free man.   Adlai Stevenson

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Some Quotes

--Hope is the poor man's bread.   George Herbert

--Genius, in truth, means little more than the faculty of perceiving in an unhabitual way.  William James

--It takes immense genius to represent, simply, and sincerely, what we see in front of us.  Edmond Duranty

--All learning has an emotional base.    Plato

--It is well to lie fallow for a while.  Martin F. Tupper

--I drink to make other people interesting.  George Jean Nathan

--Men use one another to assure their personal victory over death.   Ernest Becker

--Every dogma has its day.   Abraham Rotstein

--Gross National Product is our Holy Grail.  Stuart Udall

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Noticing

I'm just watching things unfold in our societal reality. It's interesting, and I'm feeling at least a modicum of hopefulness in the political realm.

I never knew, when I was younger, how much of what affects us relates to politics.

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Ivanka, Louise and the Little People

 I'd like to suggest a nice opinion piece by the great writer, Frank Bruni. It's published in The New York Times under the title listed above. It's dated November 25, 2017.

It talks about Ivanka Trump's suggestions for a pretty Thanksgiving dining table ("festooning the terrain around the turkey with Waterford crystal, Astier plates ($300 and up for a single place setting)..."). But, more importantly, it talks about the plutocratic cabinet Trump surrounded himself with in his first term. Here's a snippet:

--Steven Mnuchin, Treasury Secretary and a former Goldman Sachs partner--net worth, $385 million.

--Gary Cohn, director of the National Education Council--net worth, $250 million.

--Wilbur Ross, Commerce Secretary--net worth, $700 million.

--Betsy DeVos, Education Secretary--net worth, $1 billion.

That buys a lot of turkey.

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Climate Change

The fires in France and Spain seem to be getting the world's attention. A New York Times' article sums it up well, "Earth's Warming Primed France and Spain to Burn, Scientists Find." 

Also, on Bill McKibben's Substack, he had a piece called "High Heat, High Drama," which laid out the many bad things that have happened because of climate change. 

Not to sound like a Cassandra, but when will the world wake up. Time will tell, but it is running out.

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Some Nice Writing

I just wanted to share some phrases or sentences that caught my attention (primarily for their euphony).

--"like Geppetto fabricating his Pinocchio"  (Phillip Lopate)

--"the self as a social construct"  ("   ")

--"my physiological restlessness"  ("   ")

--"these societies are beset by a broad, nebulous discontent"  (Albena Azmanova)

--"To be radical is to grasp things by the root."  (Karl Marx)

--"There's something about being cooped up that calls for an abundance of comfort food."  (Whitney Perry)

--"a low-slung modern building of white bricks and smoke windows"  (Sam Freedman)

--"over-the-top opulence"  (Debbie Millman)

--"helping to seed the resentment that would later erupt in revolution"  ("   ")

--a 'pretense of undiminished vigor"  (Frank Bruni)

--"pharmacological affinities"  ("   ")

--"the calm reasoning of Aristotelian science"  (Carmen Lea Dege)

--"It's important to keep a few caveats in mind"  (Richard Conniff)

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Quotes

Here are some quotes on the topic of love from the social psychologist, Erich Fromm:

“Love isn't something natural. Rather it requires discipline, concentration, patience, faith, and the overcoming of narcissism. It isn't a feeling, it is a practice.”

“Paradoxically, the ability to be alone is the condition for the ability to love.”

“Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.' Mature love says 'I need you because I love you.”

“The mature response to the problem of existence is love.”

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Venting

I'm just venting. That is, about the state of our country, the U.S. I think even some people who support our president are beginning to see they were sold a bill of goods (and the seller keeps raising the price). 

I keep thinking--hoping--it will be like what happened in the Gilded Age and thereafter. Much bad was followed by shocking good for the masses. It seems to be playing out that way.

I will hold on to hope.

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Some Words

I always try to write down words I see in material I read that I sense are not seen frequently seen in writing. 

Here are some of them:

acrimonious adj.

tete-a-tete n.

detente n.

rapprochement n.

belle epoque n.

janissary n.

shanghai v.

ergophobia n.

satori n.

walleyed adj.

taunter n.

epiphanic adj.

feted v.

Pantagruelian adj.

Thanks.

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Thinking Out Loud

I am puzzled and bemused by what is happening politically in this country. I wish I knew how the craziness of the president will finally end. It seems like he has great momentum. But life can be tricky, so what appears at the moment may not be the reality.

I do hope that people feeling the pain through their pocketbooks will result in a big turn away from Trump. Yet, us Americans can sometimes do things that directly harm ourselves. 

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About Writing

I just read an article that I've read a number of times. It deals with "flow" in writing. It's on the Writer's Digest website, written by David Jauss ("What Writers Mean by 'Flow'"). 

I think it gives to readers one of the big "secrets" of writing. That the variation of the length of sentences and consequently the type of sentence structure, is key to good writing. 

I try to remember that, but I sometimes forget.

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