Just when we all thought that getting through February was the biggest hurdle we’d face, through snow storms and chaotic debates, made it in and out of long work days and navigated shopping centers in frigid temps and facing winter challenges, we made it into March and ran smack into the hysteria and misinformation of COVID-19. Not that The World Health Organization isn’t doing what they can to spread truth, but we’ve been well-schooled to distrust the truth, repeatedly, and ad nauseam, so much so that doubting everything we hear or read from our reporters is the new normal. So, what to do in a crisis when we are several years into a reign of doubt? I’d like to suggest that we all take a deep breath, right now, inhale and exhale, and press play to watch the waves roll in and out. Just for a few seconds. Let’s start with that.
Category Archives: Life
fair is foul and foul is fair
Since his ink hit the parchment Shakespeare has been spot on, in understanding the complexities of the heart, the highs and lows of passion, unchecked ambition that leads to treachery, and everything else that makes up the human experience. Line after line from dozens of plays and sonnets are etched forever into capturing our collective predicaments. This past month I have been steeped in such verse, wrapping up the tearful Romeo & Juliet with Freshmen, falling under the justice of Hamlet with Seniors, and delighted by a stage performance of The Tempest; curiously, this week, my thoughts run straight to Macbeth. How could they not, right? Basically nothing on any of our screens is what it actually appears to be, our entire world of commerce and health gone topsy turvy, while revenge leaches out of every Whitehouse tweet; this is the stuff of our headlines, for in every direction we face, “Fair is foul, and foul is fair.” We are media addicts all, scrolling from meme to meme, filtering out our own crow’s feet to fetishize our own sphere of influence. As we look to replace the bloat king, who dyes his comb-over and sports a cheap spray tan, (not that I take issue with hair dye or make-up, in fact I’m all for looking your very best, but his external duplicity only mirrors every level of his notorious and self-heralded double dealings); I want more than anything to see what is. Let’s step away from the media barrage, and recall Macbeth, as he chided himself against his own false faith in the witches: “Infected be the air whereon they ride; And damn’d all those that trust them! ” Let’s stop trusting those who cause more helter skelter, more “fog and filthy air.” Let’s face ourselves as raw and naked and vulnerable as that will be.
Bear Witness
As we look out our kitchen windows or drive up and over the landscapes one bears witness to a stagnant world, locked in place by the current season. A small portion of the river may remain open but this ebb and flow is dictated by the wind and sun and temperature. We can only watch. And wait. Much like all that is spinning beyond our control in Congress, in China, in Israel and Australia and in so many dark corners of our planet. Hidden places were whispering continues into the night, where false dealings and double promises are etched along party lines. 
Truly there is much that we wish to turn away from these days. Stuff that is too horrible to hold in our minds without breaking down. Who can let themselves think about the thousands of children behind detention fences? Or the 1 billion animals thought to be killed by the Australian bush fires? Or the swift rise of the coronavirus from China to the US? None of these help me out of bed in the morning, or aids my dealing with a classroom filled with teens who are already panicked over the devastation of our planet due to man’s idiocy, and what they see as just as inevitable escalation to another world war. I would love to turn a blind eye, would love not to witness any of these current crises, but their anxiety and demand for change requires more from me. To them, and the world we have created, we must bear witness with a keen eye and sharp drive toward a telling and absolute truth.
Before the night falls around us, before we can’t find our way out of despair, let us all bear witness, uncover that rare and delicate light back to kindness, utilize the brilliance of Science, lead without political pressure but with our shiny Constitution, and enter a new era our children will remember because of everything we did right.
Nine Cent Girl 