I kept my hope just like I hoped to…
(You shouldn’t break your heart over the small shit. It’s time to show them what you’re worth.)
Does your anger make you full? Damn permanent reverie.
(What could be worth it to them to sacrifice their souls to make this pact with the devil?)
There are piles of dishes in the kitchen and beautiful things burn because of stupidity. I feel unsettled, hormonal for no reason. On the full moon in Scorpio I go on the Internet and buy black silk lingerie from a fancy store in London I could never afford before but now everything is on 70% off. In the fallout of the first recession I buy red stilettos in memory of a fallen friend. This time it’s black silk, in honor of the Skirt Club that can no longer have its meetings.
A conversation occurs between Unconditional Love and Conditional Love:
I love you always.
You don’t love me the way I want you to, Goodbye.
Still, how to transfer the remaining resonating value into real intimacy and personal power?
Covid19 is an effective virus, my mother said, especially when you compare it to something like Ebola. Ebola just killed everyone it infected — didn’t have a very long lifespan outside of that, and certainly made containing its spread much easier. Covid19, on the other hand, is nearly invisible half the time, and still transmitting itself. Very well designed.
My mother is a public health specialist, worked triage way back when in San Francisco when they were flying in infants and children from the war in Vietnam. (She also worked with a few of those characters on Haight Street who took combinations of unknown drugs and ended up passed out on the sidewalk.) We often have different opinions about things, the presence of fluoride in our water, for example, or vaccines.
She is a big fan of vaccines, and I myself have remained skeptical, despite carrying around a yellow vaccine booklet documenting a few dozen different shots I’ve received over my lifetime, mostly all received when she was in charge of my health and well-being. Would I take a Covid19 vaccination now? Is this the next question of public respect? I don’t get vaccinated for myself, I get vaccinated for you.
In a way, yes.
That is how public health works. Herd immunity is a real thing, and that real thing is faltering in favor of a perception of liberty that means complete relinquishing of outside regulation. But absolute freedom also means absolute responsibility. And who is really ready for that?
I myself don’t know enough facts to say. If I trusted the government and pharmaceutical companies to make good decisions for my health on a regular basis, I would be more likely to take a vaccine unquestioned. But truth be told, the American government and pharmaceutical industry has far from a good track record in my experience. That friend I bought those red stilettos for in 2008, she died from an accidental pharmaceutical overdose in San Diego. Pain killers for a back injury and anxiety medication. America has also failed to provide me with adequate health insurance for going on a few couple decades.
Seeing as I am now on German soil, would I take a vaccine made here in Deutschland? Quite possibly. In Germany it’s not even possible to get things like Tylenol without a prescription. The pharmacies have a widely available array of plant-based and homeopathic medicines, and will sooner recommend them than something produced by a pharmaceutical company. For the most part, the German government has been behaving in a sane and sensible manner, so yes, without having to think about it too much, I probably would take a German vaccine. They do not unnecessarily encourage their population to take drugs, and rather promote a sense of balanced health and well-being.
(Unity, resonance; if we are able to listen, if there is not too much static noise in our heads, intuitively we know where we are and what we need to do right now. Like this, under sun and moonlight, deep peace, inside and out. Rest for the weary and worn down, when they need it. Here the night is only getting lighter by each minute I stay with you.)
The courts say that they might provide him with temporary immunity.
I can’t help but repeat the phrase several times in my mind. The governor is right, we don’t know what is going to happen in June, or August, or November, for that matter. What will happen when order is restored and the courts are fair and legal again, unswayed by private interest. What does is say about out national security, that its advisory board has changed hands so many times? And though it may be surprising to some, just because a test is negative today, doesn’t mean it will be negative tomorrow. This immunity is temporary, and contingent upon a variety of changeable factors.
(As we dive deep into how we listen, listening becomes a physical action. From this moment on you can ride the flow, as soon as you let go into the conversation of push and pull. Being aware of information we send, and that which we receive, all these inputs and outputs circulating…)
The best care I received came from my friends, she said. Fred, an emergency room resident, constantly checking in about her symptoms. Or Chelsea, her college roommate and a physician assistant, who largely managed her recovery from pneumonia. Another childhood friend taught her to use a pulse oximeter and inhaler, and through them she became an amateur expert.
Do breathing exercises, she says, a lot of them. (Her favorites are the ones recommended by J.K. Rowling.) The day before she went into the emergency room she ran 3 miles, walked 10 more, and ran up 5 flights of stairs with a load of laundry. Don’t get cocky, people, this virus is intelligent.
Why are more people dying of this disease in the United States than in anywhere else in the world? Because America has a for-profit health care system with pharmaceutical companies standing to make bigger profits the more people are sick and taking drugs. Like we have been saying all along, if there is no safety net, or if the safety net has holes, then people fall, and fall through, hurt themselves, or even die.
In the Governor’s mansion there are apparently ghosts up on third floor keeping watch. The Governor himself has never seen them, but there are stories. Maybe they know something we don’t, here on this plane of existence where they keep changing the facts on you and we are living with this perpetual anxiety of not knowing, having to say, once again, I don’t know. Meanwhile, he says, we can learn a lot by watching others. Like those small Democratic Socialist countries with those large well-maintained safety nets, who have been hit as well, but certainly not as hard.
If there is one thing that Americans can be proud of, however, it is their work ethic — My team has a great ethic, the Governor says. People keep thinking I am pushing them, but I’m not pushing them, they’re pushing themselves. They think they are the best, and they want to prove it.
(Very American of them, to think they are the best, but as the elders say, all our greatest strengths are also our biggest weaknesses in turn.)
Great leadership arises when it is needed, and here we stand imperfectly, making the best decisions we can at the time, with the resources and information we have available. We can only do our best, and that is what we must do. Focus on the positive changes that are possible.
I believe the facts will continue to change, he says, and in the meantime, we are going to batten the hatches. Made in China, watch out, now we are talking about Made in the Adirondacks. Allow us to rev up the engine of manufacturing on the home front and get humble again with our hands.
(He compares the beautiful intelligence of the State’s Reopening dashboard to that of a 1967 Corvette — but clearly nothing can be as beautiful as the dashboard of a 1967 Corvette, and we all smile as he flashes back to the slide of the Corvette several times.)
In Maximum City people are dying by the hundreds amidst the futile task of social distancing in the slums. The same is happening in the favelas of Rio. For me tonight it’s poker night. Feels indulgent, when compared to such things as life in the slums of India. But what else are we to do, besides fortify the ranks where we are?
The game is one of the first real social events I have attended in a couple months, and I find myself talking more than maintaining a good poker face. Talking about plants I’m growing in the windowsills, new recipes I have perfected. Distraction becomes a tactic in itself it seems, and I am a wild card player anyway. The Calling Station always wins on the River, if she doesn’t run out of money before then. And she does surely win once in a while anyway, just often enough to keep the other, more serious players, on their toes.
There are people who play to win, and there are people who play to play, engaging the game, pushing it further, even at their own expense. I am one of those players in the latter category, and it was interesting to see what happened to the game, once I went out. Suddenly it was less interesting, even boring, void the chance of risk, while people piled up their chips, worth all of 15 euros. I lost 20 euros that night, and had a lot of good conversation, some nice wine, a few good laughs. Would have been nice to win, but there were a few hands laid out that were nearly artistic, even if they didn’t win.
I got a ride home with the Queens of St. Laurent that night. I found myself amazed at their subculture, amazed by how many different people there are in the world, each with their own lives and legacies. Just as the Youtube algorithms point us in particular directions, so we do the same for ourselves, without even knowing.
All these people we would never know, unless by chance we stumble down their rabbit hole.