Stumbling Toward Understanding?

Mid-October’s cooler temperatures, I hope, will help douse the fiery social and political rages of summer. But the weather, even if it has some impact, will not solve the problems arising from universal fury. If we have a any realistic hope of solving those problems, we have to stop fanning the flames. The option is to allow the fire to spread until our society burns, leaving the spoils to the “victors;” that is, the surviving bloodied and beaten combatants and the other survivors who did their best to avoid the fray.

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I have mixed feelings about protests. On the one hand, I think people need to strongly express opposing opinions and philosophies. On the other, protests can too easily turn into name-calling and accusatory rants that wound their targets so deeply the damage is almost impossible to heal. And protests can harden opinions that can be questioned into certainties that are not subject to argument. I am just as guilty as the next person, though. Calling entire segments of the population stupid, moronic, evil, ignorant, and a host of other offensive epithets does not make reconciliation easy.

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My improvement from my most recent bout of what I will call “sickness” is slower than I hoped it would be. All my life, I have been advised that, as people get older, injuries are slower to heal. The same is true, I think, about illness. I am unwillingly demonstrating the validity of the claim. Nonetheless, I believe I am making progress. Because I have been extremely weak lately, I cancelled a massage appointment I had scheduled for today. I doubt having a treatment today would have been relaxing and enjoyable, anyway.

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Once again, I’m burning a cone of incense while I sit in my study trying to write something someone might find worth reading. Today, though, I’ve switched to Dragon’s Blood scent; the scent of the last cone I burned was labeled Full Moon. My favored scent remains Patchouli, but I enjoy the variety of exploring others. Yesterday, we reclined on the loveseat in the entertainment room (originally a bedroom), listening to a selection of soft contemporary classical music. That experience might be enhanced, for me, by burning a cone of Patchouli incense, but the smoke might annoy the cat…and mi novia. If I cannot find it in me to write something of interest, I will be satisfied to have tried.

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I watched, live, some of the service at our UU church this morning. I watched only a little because the sound quality was poor…not because of what was broadcast, but because my computer monitor’s built-in speakers are about as cheap and inadequate as any on the market. I haven’t been to church in quite a long time; so long that I am sure I would not recognize many members and friends who have joined in the last year or more. I vacillate between wanting to go in person and wanting to spend my Sundays at home; my oncologist advises me to avoid crowds to the extent I can, so I use that as justification for my sloth.

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My enthusiasm is not at its nadir, but neither is it at its zenith. I may have some ice cream to improve things.