It is 9:22 AM on Sunday, October 6th, 2024. We’re in a heat wave – or dome as they now call it – and it is actually warm in the morning. It is rare to not need a jacket in the mornings here in Pacifica but it is rarer still when it is downright warm, like a summer’s morning in Ohio. I woke up at my usual time of 5:30 AM, read the news, solved the jumble and had planned on writing outside but my youngest woke up so we chatted a bit on the patio instead. Again, the morning was exceptionally warm and very quiet except for the occasional crow of the rooster next door.
Yes, I said rooster. My neighbors have an astounding lack of self-awareness for those around them. They purchased a rooster a week ago and it crows at the crack of dawn. I am ambivalent about it being both sometimes annoyed and sometimes not too bothered. These are the neighbors that run a daycare so produce a lot of noise during the day and sometimes in the evening like to play loud music. Having lived in Japan I’m much more aware of how others might feel around me and so I’m amazed at how so many back in the USA don’t seem to have this sense at all. Perhaps my neighbors are a reflection of what America has become which is only caring about yourself, the individual over everything else.
As always time has been passing rapidly and hard to believe the summer travels are now months past. It is the beginning of my favorite time of year which is when the holiday season starts. The best time for me is mid-October as we have three holidays to look forward to. However, as I get older I need to make a conscious effort to get excited as it no longer happens naturally.
This brings me to my mindset which I’d characterize as numb, apathetic, and perhaps indifferent. The days fly by in a blur and my mood is neutral. I miss youthful excitement about anything. Sometimes I’ll catch a flicker of it when watching a movie and get motivated about something but that is rare. I just follow my daily routine which activities are just work and karate without any feeling at all.
As for today it is now very warm and our air conditioner has already turned on. Here in the Bay Area most people don’t even have air conditioners and neither did we until we got a new “heat pump” air handling system where air conditioning is just the other side of the coin to how the heating works. The fan goes in one direction to create heat from the air and in the other direction to pull heat from the house. This is only the second time I’ve seen the air conditioning being used.
The activity today is a our dojo’s cookout. We have to do just a little karate and then eat, drink, socialize while the kids play with water guns. Unfortunately it is going to be around 90 degrees which is not normal for the peninsula and a park next to the bay.
News of the Day
The Southeast just experienced the worst hurricane since they have been recorded. The Earth is heating up due to climate change yet the Republicans are still in denial. We really are doomed as a species. With events such as these occurring every year you think humanity would be in a panic with everyone onboard to find a solution. So many are not rational and we got a taste of this with the COVID pandemic. COVID was killing so many and through the brilliance of science a vaccine found. And what did half of America do? They refused to mask or take the vaccine! With climate change you have a good bit of the country getting destroyed and people losing their homes and communities and what will they do? They’ll still vote Republican and deny climate change. Thousands can die, you can lose your home and they’ll still vote for the party that wants to exacerbate the problem. This should be a case study in the future where drastic change causes many people to act irrationally. I remain severely disappointed in so many.
The election is coming up and the fate of the US hangs in the balance. The US used to stand for that which was good and just, or at least that was the general perception. If Trump wins we’ll be a country of lies, of fear, of persecution. We’ll be the villains instead of Superman. We’ll be taking steps back in terms of minority and women’s rights. Just when you think the bar has been set as low as it can go Trump finds a way to make it lower and his cult cheers him on. Every accusation from them is an admission with perhaps the most visible being election rigging. They say the election was stolen – an outright lie – yet they take steps to gerrymander, to intimidate, to limit voting and are the ones who have been sent to jail (Tina Peters for example) of tampering with results. Republicans are either stupid, bad, ignorant, ruthless, self-serving, uncaring or perhaps all of the above. I had to look up a word to describe some of the politicians who are simply self serving without any moral considerations and came up with machiavellian.
As you can see the direction of the country and the idiocy of Trump weighs on my mind. This is only natural as the fate of my country hangs in the balance but also there is always another new low when I read my morning news. Again, I remain in disbelief that people I know could support such a person. Now I see upfront how entire countries can go wrong. I had thought we were too advanced for something like this to happen and I was wrong.
Well, it is now very warm and I’m getting concerned for the days events. It is going to be too hot to stay long at the cookout and everyone will be sweating all over the place. I know I’ve grown soft from living in a chilly locale but even in Ohio I don’t recall having to deal with 90 degree days much and even then we’d just stay indoors. When I was very young we didn’t have air conditioning and stayed in front of the fan. When we moved to our new house around 1986 we finally had air conditioning and it was great.
I guess I have somewhat pinpointed part of the cause of my ‘numb’ mental state. My country might turn into the villain and the planet may be uninhabitable in the future. All the while half my country votes for these outcomes and I’ve lost personal friends because of it. We should be in crisis mode but just bumble along incapable of determining the correct course.
One more thing before I go. My mindset is somewhat poor due to existential threats but I’m not facing immediate catastrophe such as a friend with whom I studied in Japan. She lives in Beirut Lebanon which has been getting attacked and soon to be invaded by Israel. Those from the Middle East and/or third world countries who study overseas usually come from very rich families and so I’m pretty sure that was the case with her. I sent her a note to check on her when all this started going down and she let me know that Lebanon is pretty much a doomed country. Here in the USA we may turn into a villain but at least we are not getting immediately attacked by an army with the threat of an entire country imploding.
We are insulated in the cocoon of empire and so most people have no idea about the grim realities of the world we inhabit like my friend. We bitch about social issues and gas prices, not the fear of getting bombed by a hostile nation. Another I’ve been concerned about from some time was a Uighur, the minority group in Northwest China whom the government put into concentration, reeducation, work camps. I wonder if that is where he is now or if he was able to escape to another country.
Well, it is now 10:16 and I should start preparing for the upcoming activities of today.
