Intervention

A neighbor spotted a bald eagle cruising through our city neighborhood. It picked off a squirrel from her front yard. We’d best look out for our cats and dogs, she admonished.

It was warm and sunny outside—70 degrees—a rare gem of a day in a Minnesota fall, so it was a double loss for my cat Skippy, that I had to bring him inside. I could see too clearly the dark weight of the plunging eagle, its talons pressing into his soft flanks, then lifting him up to the sky.

F. says it’s just nature—the eagle has to eat. But it’s my nature to intervene—nestle the baby bird in a bed of cotton, run the injured bunny to the rehab clinic.

It makes me think of the coronavirus: is it some part of the natural order? Is it culling the human population, as a pack of wolves culls a herd of deer, removing its sick and old? Maybe. But where’s God? Why doesn’t He intervene, as I would, to protect us from the worst?

I’d like a miracle please. I’d like the virus to disappear. For all the people of the world to fall to their knees in stunned gratitude, rise again with a deeper humility.

I try to slough off the virulence floating in the air—the virus, and also the lies, the conspiracy rumors, the simmering violence. Hold fast to my belief in goodness.

Suddenly I see my own smallness, a fleck of skin bobbing on the ocean’s surface. To die is nothing--just a release into the gentle rocking of the waves.

I'm Not Gonna Lie ...

 I’ve stopped blogging because I’m depressed. I‘ve stopped believing that sometime within the next six months covid will be over.

I’ve cherished the hope that the election, with a Biden win, would lift the dark cloud hanging over our country—the cloud that spurned covid, and violence, and chaos, and contempt. But suddenly I realized that, even with Trump out, we will be facing months or years under the threat of a deadly virus.

Worse. I can’t get Max out of his room. He’s tethered to a bank of devices. He takes no initiative to look for a job or sign up for college classes or cook something or … anything except talk to and get together with friends. It drives me crazy. I have to goad and prod and schedule to make anything happen, and for the first time in his life, I resent this role. I’m disappointed in him. I’m afraid for him. I’m angry, I’m conflicted –should I pull back entirely, force him to act or stagnate on his own? Should I create some structure for both of us? Should I just have him check in with me once a week? No shoulds, I guess. What’s working, what’s not?

I can’t do it anymore—there’s just nothing left inside--and F. is just as baffled and confused as I am. I need help and support and relief for myself. I have set up a medication adjustment for Max, I’ve inquired about a vocational counselor for him. I’d like to sign up a driving instructor. Maybe, even, get him a life coach.

But I’m overwhelmed and scared. I’m furious at Trump and those who didn’t take the virus seriously in the beginning--and have put us all in danger, as the virus surges out of control.

I’m just tired. So terribly tired.

Grieving What Was: Then and Now

 I grew up on the outer fringe of a new suburb, our freshly-built ranch house abutting a gnarled apple orchard, a meadow of goldenrod and milkweed and Queen Anne’s Lace, a ravine that plunged down to a creek. As kids, we travelled in small groups: myself, Sheree, Renee, Timmy, and Mary Ellen. Sometimes we’d venture into the world beyond our neighborhood and walk down to the one-lane road that ran along the Schuylkill River.

About a mile down, we’d find what we were looking for—a concrete structure rooted just next to the river. Its massive columns rose to a highway, which began its launch across the river—and abruptly stopped, midair. I remember it fascinated me, this strange fragment of a former time, this monument of a daring hope left unfulfilled. We named it the Bridge to Nowhere.

My Family, My Politics

There’s a way to talk to people who like Trump without hating each other. By "people" I mean my own family-of-origin. Noelle and her husband and I had a carefully-worded discussion over the phone. They of course, take the opposite side in the Trump/Biden debate. There were a few tense moments.