Friday, September 12, 2014

The United States of Amnesia


I know, I know... I'm way behind on reporting about the last days chez nous Taos and the trip back East, and all that blah blah blah. Know what? don't care. It's one of those days I could care less how far behind I am on anything, and it's a damn good thing the sun decided to show its face here in Maine this morn as yesterday, chilly, grey and rainy, left me cringing with sudden loathing for my location, In a "charming cottage" the size of a tissue box, sunk among the trees (you wonder how early settlers hacked living in these teeny things without killing themselves or each other), and ill-equipped to deal with the weather given a suitcase full of weightless summer cottons suitable to dry New Mexico heat.   

I've come to loathe the automobile, hence my in-town location. Here, as in NM, I have to walk a half mile or so to get a 'long view' to anything like a field or body of water; relief from that sense that I'm being entombed, one nail at a time.  I escaped to the cavernous relief of the local theatre and Woody Allen's new film yesterday, cinematically enchanting, but you gotta wonder what's in the guy's head anymore. It felt overacted, going for the witty repartee of an old Kate Hepburn movie, perhaps, a period feel, but Colin Firth, bless 'im, is by nature a slower burn than that, and what'sername from The Help alarmingly wide-eyed and unconvincing in her role. Still, a passably entertaining few hours (despite frequent squirming in my seat), if only for the pleasure of seeing delicately embroidered, diaphanous women's clothes and gorgeous Provence scenery.

Today I read about the difference in how America and Europe raise their chickens, market their eggs,  inner resistance flares as the longing rises from somewhere deep in my soul for a long view out to sea, another lifestyle, a more open minded populace... cheap wine and produce, real pastry, free health care. I was searching my blog archive for a video I thought I'd posted long ago about the resveratrol content of a sencha and jasmine tea combo to send a friend when I came across this video from back when I had more fire in the belly for politics (currently at a low disgusted ebb). It reminds me that there's a price to pay for cowardice, for the willful amnesia to which we as a nation have succumbed.  I wonder what in the end will be the ultimate price of that cowardice, as we fail to hold accountable those who, at our expense, violated their oath, flat out lied to the public, launched Shock and Awe, destroyed our credibility abroad,  sowed the seeds that destroyed  our economy, are in essence responsible for the ISIL mess now, and who the media still pretend are worthy of respectful attention.  

I once saw Robert F. Kennedy, JR., speak on the subject of restoring the nation's rivers.  He is no less eloquent here.


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