I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW THE RAIN IS GONE

Even since that Saturday, the afternoon presidential election was declared for Biden, this Jimmy Cliff song, with that cool reggae beat, has been going around in my brain...

 

I can see clearly now the rain is gone

I can see all obstacles in my way

Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind

It's gonna be a bright (bright)

Bright (bright) sunshiny day

It's gonna be a bright (bright)

Bright (bright) sunshiny day

Oh, yes I can make it now the pain is gone

All of the bad feelings have disappeared

Here is that rainbow I've been praying for

It's gonna be a bright (bright)

Bright (bright) sunshiny day

 

Truthfully, realistically, the odds are not exactly good for a bright sunshiny day most days in November, in Vermont, anyway.  But it is nice to feel that a weight has been lifted.  A weight that's been hanging overhead since November of 2016, and that year most certainly wasn't a good one.  In that January, Ken and I had spent a few days in to New York City.  He tired more easily by that time, but yet we managed museums, walking, eating out.  He was more or less okay.  A few months later, in the spring, we visited a good friend who was living in Seville for a few months, a trip that had its complications, although it had a number of lighter moments, some fun, even.  (See "The Rain in Spain" post of 5/23/16)  It would be our last trip together.  After a dismal month or two, Ken died, just days before the election, having cast his final vote for Hillary Clinton.  He never knew Trump would become President. Had he known he would have been as astonished as everyone.  

But this year, this strange year, surpasses any I've known for sheer all around horribleness.  It's possible to see more clearly now much of what was hiding behind the curtain of daily Trump outrages.  The oh-my-God news that happened almost hourly, overkill insanities, sapped our mental and emotional energy.  Laid bare now, with that constant assault out of the way, are the issues we should have been seeing.  Issues like our changing climate, the alienation of our former allies, our global pandemic, our national pandemic, myriad humanitarian concerns across the globe, institutional racism, poverty here and elsewhere, student debt, cyber security... I could go on, but I have already overwhelmed myself. All this doesn't exactly promise a sunshiny day.

Yet...

There are sunny days, but clouds demand one's attention at this time of year.

It is literally clearer here now, too, for it's easy to see things with the foliage out of the way.  Not prettier, but more transparent.  I don't really dislike the change, partly because it is a change, although hunting season discourages me from venturing into the woods, even wearing hunter's orange, and that is disappointing because that openness is so inviting.  It doesn't help that there's a family further up the road that doesn't pay enough attention to hunting regulations.  Last year, on one day after the end of hunting season, when the previous night had laid down a thin layer of snow, the path we made, Skyler and me, were the only prints to be seen. Until we came upon some very disturbed snow behind this particular family's land.  There were streaks of blood on top of the snow and drag marks showing something heavy had been pulled to a place where there were tractor marks that led directly to their house.  Skylers sniffed out a pile of entrails right nearby where an animal had been gutted.  Such evidence of a deer shot after the end of the season may be circumstantial, but it is damning, like what Henry Thoreau called "finding a trout in the milk."  After the end of the current rifle season rifle shots have been heard coming from the same direction once again.  So, I'm not going into the woods just yet, clear and inviting as they are.

Three does came to visit very early one morning, days before hunting season began. 

This extra visual clarity allows me to see the rocky hills behind the field, as if a green curtain has suddently been removed.  It helps to a degree with deer hunting, except that everything looks some shade of brown or beige, so it's more likely a rustling sound that you listen for.  More often than not, that turns out to be squirrels messing around in the dry leaves.  Also newly visible this time of year, or possibly newly created, is the line Skyler makes in the grass, the line that Skyler believes limits his area.  Why it only appears in the fall is a bit of a mystery.  Skyler's line is actually off by several feet from the "dangerous edge," but he's taking no chances. It's an electric fence, but I don't even put his collar on any more, so nothing would happen if he crossed over.  (Don't tell him that, though.)

The ridge that summer hides.

Why Skyler creates the exact same path is a bit puzzling.

The lack of rain in late summer and early fall exposed things, too.  A few weeks ago I took a walk that led to Bittersweet Falls, a secluded den where a broad waterfall normally cascades.  But sans rainwater, there was only a mossy cliff.

A dried up Bittersweet Falls, although a recent rain may have helped.()

Sometimes looking back makes events look clearer, too.  I recently watched a documentary about Ronald Reagan.  I remember his presidency so I thought I already knew everything there was to know about him. What I didn't know was that "Make America Great Again" was his 1980 campaign slogan.  That message was accompanied by many of the same racial dog whistles.  Not exactly original, DJT.  And–this one I did remember–Reagan selected cabinet members who were put in charge of organizations they would aim to destroy. Probably the worst of a bad lot was James Watt, Interior Secretary: anti-conservation, anti-wilderness, anti-environment–you name it.  Not exactly original, DJT.  Deregulation, too, "getting "government off the backs of the people."  You rode that as well, DJT.  To top it off,  Reagan was also the first media persona (B-movie star, TV host, etc.) to become President.  Not the first, DJT.  A fervent but probably vain hope I have is that he be the last. 

We can always look beyond the clouds and hope for better things, right?

THE ILLUMINATI ARE COMING FOR YOU!

They're coming to get you!  

It's not BLACK LIVES MATTER that's coming to get you (although maybe they should be), but plain old white folks who are out to get the mobs (meaning protesters), and the looters (meaning protesters), and the violent (meaning protesters, the angry ones, or maybe other groups) and thereby save us all (meaning us white folks. Who else could it be?).  

Paranoia, merely paranoia.  But, oh, paranoia can do a lot of damage.  And paranoia goes way back.  In truth, it has never been absent.  

In the 1980's there was a national mass hysteria about Satanic ritual abuse.  Are any of us old enough to remember?  It was widely believed that young children, preschoolers, were being subjected to ritual abuse.  It began in California, in the McMartin Preschool.  It was believed that the teachers had tortured and raped children, killed them and drank their blood, and so on and so on.  You don't want to know the ways.  (Toddlers were interviewed by therapists, for those who do not know the stories.)  Or maybe it began earlier with a supposedly autobiographical book (one that I'd never heard of at the time) about discovering abuse through "recovered memories," memories that weren't, until they suddenly were.  The hysteria became a fever.  It was fed by talk shows (even Oprah), articles, books, lectures–it was everywhere.  It grew gravitas.  It became an international conspiracy–the elite were said to be abducting children world-wide for Satanic purposes.  People were prosecuted.

Every conspiratorial notion forms from a tiny grain of truth, like an oyster its pearl.

I remember a case that arose when I lived in Boston in 1984 as this hysteria was well underway, when teacher after teacher at the Fells Acres Preschool was accused of raping the children in their care in a variety of fanciful ways that seemed to me, even then, highly improbable. The stories were weird, and involved secret rooms, a clown, trees, and, I think, animals. Several teachers were sent to prison with lengthy sentences.  One was not released until 2004, another died in prison.  

That was before everyone started forwarding messages on the internet.

Therapists played an important role spreading the "recovered memory" theory of memory.  Until they didn't.  

Debunked.  Conspiracies.  All of it.  People learned from this.  

You would think.

This is an actual poster that I first saw in the background of a photo of a Trump supporter.  Conspiracies lie beneath.

Laughable, maybe. (That head, that body!) But I wonder. What might someone be thinking or feeling about the country, or our government, to exhibit this kind of adulation?  I read that some of those who kept vigil outside Walter Reed Hospital had signs that said Trump was a gift from God.  This is adulation to the power of ten.  What is he is supposed to be fighting?  It's more than just the usual political issues.  There's hellfire here.  Religiosity. We know that some believers identify a major evil that reads a lot like Satanic ritual abuse of children. All too familiar.  (Thank the Qnon faction for throwing in that idea.)  

What is it that is so compelling that it elevates Trump to this insane level?  I have trouble putting myself in that place.  What is that place?  What does it look like?

Many of us (I include myself here) feel strongly about the role of government; we want it to support public education, the nation's health, our environment, and we expect it to keep us safe vis à via infrastructure, a sensible foreign policy (arguable, precisely what that is), equitable policing to keep us safe (more of a wish, unfortunately; see Black Lives Matter), and you can imagine the rest. 

But I don't see a god anywhere.  

So what is it, this missing element that looks to Trump so worshipfully?

Is it fear? Fear of what?

I think of the fears of the white slaveowners when emancipation turned their world upside down, when it came about that the people they oppressed were now to be equal to them.  Many just gritted their teeth, hating it, silently. Many couldn't bear it, and needed to conspire, to act.  Bitter and smug in their imagined superiority, men formed secret societies to attempt to return the world to what it was before. We know that they failed, but their failure was an incomplete one. People still fear the protests of Black Lives Matter. 

Among other fears. There must be many.

I come to the Illuminati.  I suppose they come to mind because I wrote a paper about them in graduate school, probably after reading historian Richard Hofstadter's "The Paranoid Style in American Politics," published in 1964, that I remember reading in the 1970's.

The Illuminati were the USA's first off-the-wall hysteria.  (The Salem witch business happened in the 1600's before we were a nation, so I'm not counting that.)  The full name of the group was the Bavarian Illuminati, Bavaria being in southern Germany, because they originated in Europe in the late 1770's as a secret society formed to combat superstition, abuses of state power and the like.  They were essentially a by-product of the Enlightenment.  Secret organizations, like Freemasons, were a thing for like-thinking groups of men. And not only then.  George Washington was a Freemason.  So was my father, for that matter. 

Secret societies are like catnip for conspiracy lovers.  Starting from the pulpits of Massachusetts the Illuminati were pilloried, atheists that they were assumed to be, accused of conspiring to abolish Christianity and overturn the government and–again, there was that sexual element–it was preached that they advocated sensual pleasure and promiscuity. Unclean!  Save the children!

It was unlikely, at best, that any actual "Bavarian Illuminati" ever set foot in this country.  Nonetheless, the complete lack of evidence failed to slow the fear until the early 1800's when the failure of a Christian demise or lack of a government coup wore down the Illuminati fear factor.  

Well, that's not really true.  There is a film called "American Illuminati" (2017) that purports to tell the "real history of America as you've never known it.  The shocking truth of how America was engineered and controlled by a secret organization that has infiltrated religious groups, political parties, universities and corporations."  You can get it on Amazon Prime.  Although it told me it is "currently unavailable to watch in your location" (what's wrong with my location?), I'm told that if I watched this item I would also like "Prison On Earth, Beyond the New World Order," "Shadow Government," "Unsealed Conspiracy Files," "God Kings, the Descendents of Jesus," and "Alien Agenda." 

I demurred.

Here is a happier note.  For a bit of balance, I would argue that it's always fun to see some enthusiasm, maybe even adulation, on the other side.  Herewith:

 The house, by the way, is not really crooked, the street is slanted, but I decided to leave it this way.

INTO THE REAL –OR UNREAL– WORLD

 

Checking to see what's out there.  
(Actually: Edward Hopper, "Carolina Morning")

“Welcome back to the real world,” was the laconic announcement by a crew member of the Elizabeth Ann, the people-only (no cars) ferry returning us from Monhegan Island to Port Clyde on the mainland, and who a few days earlier, on our trip out, had announced in witty detail how to use the ship’s toilet, seeing as the navigation and ship safety was pretty much taken care of in the crew's very capable hands.

The Elizabeth Ann comes into Port Clyde

Was I back in the real world?  Did I ever really leave it?  This was my first time out of Vermont since when...February?  Or was it January?  It's hard to remember; it might as well have been a year ago, that other time remembered as a different kind of life. And yet it was only to Maine, not exactly Japan where I’d hoped to be at exactly this time. 

Two Views of Monhegan House, where we stayed:
As it looks now (above) and as painted by Jamie Wyeth,
before the porch was rebuilt.

Monhegan feels idyllic, a place away.  That, of course, is the prime virtue of an island, especially one far away, in this case twelve miles from the mainland.  A place to recoup, reset, renew.  While we (my daughter Leah and I) were hiking one day we met two young women, both doctors fresh from New York City who had been overwhelmed with pandemic patients for months at Beth Israel and Maimonides hospitals, respectively. One woman said she’d been so stressed she’d considered giving up medicine. This was their first complete break, and they were loving it.

 

Islands do that for you.  As a visitor you have a powerful sense of having left the real world behind.  And you have–literally.  On Monhegan there is nothing to do but hike the enchanted forest and the staggeringly beautiful cliffs along the eastern side of the island, watch the people and the dogs all of whom will look familiar after a day or so, and eat and sleep. There are few distractions: no bars, no clubs, no meeting places other than the schoolhouse and the church.

 

There is this one pub, warm weather only, with made-for-pandemic seating areas put together with  
lobster traps and painted blue.  

 

And yet:  Its beauty is surprisingly elusive to many a painter and photographer. Not that its attractions are subtle; the sea beating against the immense cliffs, the mossy paths through the dense forest, charming cottages–all that.   And not that pretty paintings and photographs aren’t the result, it’s just that certain kinds of beauty inevitably tend to show up as less dramatic than they are in reality. Or sometimes they are merely seascape clichés.  

 

The arrangement of lighthouse, sheds and boat are an irresistible shot, and the scene has found its
way into many paintings.

 

In the background, Black Head. Could you tell it rises 160 feet above the sea?

Leah perches on a precipice that may be 100 feet or so above the sea.

Enchanting forest trails beckon.

 

  Perhaps you also have to concentrate on the more intimate views.

 

The island is small enough (a mere 4.5 square miles) that people start looking familiar after a few days. We met nearly all the resident artists who were there this season. We visited the home and studio of one artist who lives on Monhegan permanently. That makes her one of only about fifty people who live here the year-round.  Probably many, or most, year-rounders are there because on Monhegan lobstering is allowed in winter when other lobstering sites are closed.  Her studio is full of her paintings of islanders. Leah asked what life is like when the tourists are gone. “It’s like a dysfunctional family,” she said.  A day or so later when we were sitting on the porch of our inn I recognized one of her subjects walking by. 

An artist's home and studio crammed with her paintings of islanders

 

One evening at dinner a woman sitting at a nearby table said, loudly enough for most of us to hear, “I said I was lonely!” and stood up and marched out of the dining room.  In the winter, I wondered, where can you go after you throw down your napkin and stomp out of the kitchen?

 

The day we left the island we saw one of the lobster boats, converted to one that offered fishing trips and tours, that had just pulled up to the dock and was unloading a family of tourists. On either side of the helm, starboard and port, there were large flags, one an American flag, and the other a Trump flag. It seemed like an unwise business choice.  Since when have political candidates had flags, anyway?  Was this for a Trump Nation?  His boat wasn’t alone.  On the other side of the dock was another lobster boat I hadn’t seen before with the same rig: American flag and Trump flag. Here, I thought, was one part of the dysfunctional family.  

 

Many of the guys you see driving beaten up old pickup trucks on the few dirt roads on the island, carrying tourist luggage or food and supplies from the ferry are likely to be lobstermen in the off-season.  From the pickup trucks to the lobster boats, the pickup trucks of the sea. But maybe they’re all of different minds, not fervent Trumpers at all. I am only an ignorant drop-in, after all and know nothing of the life that is lived here.  Still, I realized that Monhegan wasn’t all that distinct from the real world.  That’s only a tourist’s notion.  I did wonder, though, do the portrait artist and the guys with the Trump flags relate to each other in the winter?  Do they even talk?  And really, what does it means to be in the “real world” when each person can assemble their own reality. A world where news and views and, increasingly, conspiracies, are curated just for you.  (Thank you for that, social media.)  What, exactly, is the real world?     

I’ve often referred to living in Vermont as living inside a bubble–not the real world– but that’s not really true either. In the small town nearest me there is a house with two flags, one American, one Trump. I wouldn’t be surprised that if more people owned flagpoles there might well be more Trump flags.  Some of us with Black Lives Matter signs have had them stolen or vandalized. (Mine was taken down, I’m pretty sure, by wind.)  The same divisions cut through here as elsewhere, but they’re jut harder to see.  And where there is natural beauty, we sometimes are like tourists in our own land. 

INVADED!

                                      

 

Serenity beckons...

 

The Voles

 

In the field, all over the septic mound, in the raised beds, in the border gardens:  holes, holes, holes.  And trails.  In the vegetable beds the low-hanging tomato that looks perfect from the front may have nothing more to it than a front, what with the backside completely chewed off.  The holes and the trails between holes make for an even bumpier ride when I mow with the tractor on the hard clay. The culprit:  voles!  Voles are a bit larger than mice, and look more like hamsters. They may have several litters a season and reproduce exponentially.  Why so many now, why this particular summer?  You would think there are enough vole predators; owls, hawks, weasels, raccoons, snakes and coyotes all eat voles. They’re near the bottom of the food chain.  Come on, predators, it’s a buffet!  Normally voles that aren’t eaten die by drowning.  Rain will pour down their uncovered holes and fill the burrows underneath. But this summer they’ve been undisturbed it seems, by flooding anyway, as the weather is staying dry with only occasional showers and short-lived rain storms. To date I doubt a single vole died by drowning.  

 

Vole signs, with the tip of my foot for sizing

The Frogs

In 2017 when the natural pool was new word got around very quickly in frog world.  It wasn’t more than a day after the pool was filled that frogs moved in.  This became awkward when it turned out three years ago that granddaughter Audrey was afraid of frogs.  (True no longer.)  Determined to get her to swim one day, her brother kindly captured every frog he could find and brought it down to the big muddy pond in front of the house.  He must have caught at least ten.  It wasn’t more than an hour later that they were all back. Don’t ask me why.  This summer there is once again, an abundance of frogs.  I had anticipated this back in early spring when I spotted floats of frog eggs and managed to dispose of some of them.  They are there in abundance now, enough of them, including tadpoles, to keep many a heron, snake, goose, raven or hawk happy.  There are a couple of snakes that hang out near the pool (I found one swimming one day), plenty of hawks and herons around, and for all I know, maybe they’ve all been busy doing their thing when I’ve not been looking. I don't really mind having frogs, to tell the truth.

I think it's interesting that on the afternoon of the same day I wrote the above, a heron was stalking the pond (not the natural pool).  Meanwhile, in the pool, unlike every day this summer, no frogs were sitting along the edge.  Not a one.  In fact, when I explored, no large frogs were to be seen.  I did find two very small ones among the reeds.  Had the heron already visited the pool?  Or were the frogs just in hiding?  Time will reveal all.  Maybe.

The Mice

I made a mistake one day after shopping at Agway.  I bought birdseed and put it in the back of the car.  It was raining when I got home, so I left it there overnight.  That overnight turned into two overnights.  When I went to get the bag out of the car I noticed mouse droppings.  Uh oh, I thought, and I looked around to see what else they might have done.  When I lifted the cover to the spare tire I saw a mouse nest. Made with what could only be the car’s insulation.  Lovely.  On my next trip to the hardware store I bought some peppermint oil sachets–mouse repellents. They seem to work.  The other location mice seem to frequent is the basement.  This isn’t surprising in winter; what mouse wouldn’t want a nice warm and protected home? My mouse traps (baited with peanut butter) are usually pretty effective, but I’ve found that when you place them with the bait opening facing the wall (mice like to move along walls), they odds on catching them improve. Meanwhile, in the car, now smelling of peppermint, the repellent seemed to work.  That's what I thought. Then I looked again.  They were back. Oh no! Time for real traps! 

So much for peppermint oil sachet repellent!

The Swallows

 

Barn swallows like to nest in the rafters of barns, but front porches are considered every bit as welcoming.  Every summer they build at least two nests somewhere on my front porch.  Last year there were three nests and an attempt, never followed through, for a fourth.  Nest building is sloppy and dried mud and pieces of straw get stuck to the walls.  Once a pair tried nesting right over the front door. I noticed it in the early stage of nest building because every time I went in or out there were new clumps of mud stuck to the door.  That was one site too far for me.  It’s interesting watching the parents swoop into the nest with insects for the babies. But when those babies start to grow, they add daily to the pile of bird poop on the floor beneath the nest. Unlike the case with the mice and the voles, however, I don’t mind living with swallows.  It’s just that I resent them when I have to clean up their mess at the end of summer.

Nest building is a messy process, as the light fixture on the porch will attest.

 

The Weeds

 

When you own a field as well as a garden and a wet area (pond and pool) to boot, you will have every weed imaginable. Every year it seems there’s one weed that’s particularly outstanding for its ability to annoy, nevermind the fact that every weed on earth is the progenitor of our beloved garden beauties. Weed-of-the-year honors change annually only because one year there may be more of it than another, or more of it in the wrong places.  This year is the year of Plant X, the single weed I am unable to find in any of the guides of Vermont weeds.  Pulling it up isn’t hard, but my hand is left feeling sticky.  If you let it get too big before you pull it, you risk the small prickly thorns that have grown on the stem. It’s not exactly a pretty plant, and it doesn’t even pretend to blend in.  It’s just sticks itself out there.  Up yours, it says.  Of course it’s not the only annoying weed.  There’s another  that is annoying on a yearly basis, and that is burdock.  It has huge leaves which would be fine if it wasn’t for the giant burrs that open up in July.  Getting one attached to hair, yours or the dog’s is pure murder.  Burdock wants to grow everywhere, and would if it could.  A runner up for worst weed is thistle.  If thistle was confined to unmown fields, I could live with it, but this year it’s been growing amid the grass. This could give you second thoughts about running around barefoot.   

The unnamed annoying weed

 

Why oh why do weeds grow when grass has given up?

The Unknown 

 

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about visiting bears.  People in all the neighboring towns have reported bear sightings, bears rummaging around in their compost heap, bears tearing apart bird feeders, bears merely lumbering through back yards.  Often they attack bird feeders as they love the taste of sunflower seeds. My bird feeder that holds sunflower hearts has ended up on the ground twice in the past week or so.  But bears make a bigger mess than what I found. The feeder was intact and plenty of the seed was left inside and right nearby.  Bears smash up feeders. They scatter the seed. They don’t dip into compost piles daintily, like raccoons dip into mine.  It was odd that the lid on the feeder had been unscrewed from the seed holder, as if it was done with deliberation, unscrewed by something with, well, hands.  And good old watchdog Skyler, almost always on alert, said not a word.

AWAY FROM IT ALL––REALLY?

Talk about being in a bubble, beyond the reach of what’s happening elsewhere. 

But am I?   Are you?   Is anyone?

In the small northern Vermont town of Lowell a guy who had been in a meditation retreat in an isolated cabin since mid-March, no phone, no media, no human contact, emerged to a changed world.  It blew his mind. (“Did I Miss Anything? A Man Emerges From a 75 Day Silent Retreat,” NYTIMES, June 3,2020)  

It blows my mind, too.  And I haven’t been hiding.

In the 1930’s when the notion of building a north-south highway that would mirror the then-new Skyline Drive in Virginia was proposed to the Vermont legislature the plan, after much debate, was defeated, but not so much because of environmental reasons (although there were plenty of those) but because it would encourage “outsiders” to come to the state.  Outsiders in those days meant people from New York City, people who were thought to be, well, different.  The Vermont Digger, an on-line Vermont news source, in a March 2015 story mentions that more than “a hint of anti-Semitism” wafted through the opposition.  A 1995 write up by The Vermont Historical Society fails to make any such reference.  

Outsiders have been seen as “different” for a very long time.  But we already knew that.

In the 1960’s I was in an automobile accident at a ski area, probably Mt. Snow, during a snowstorm with my first husband and a college friend who was in the back seat.  As we left the slopes the snow became heavy and our car skidded across the road.  Then were hit by another car from behind.  (It wasn’t serious, but I remember being in the hospital overnight.) We were driving a VW Beetle.  The car that hit us was a Mercedes.  The next day the Brattleboro Reformer wiped its hands of all of us in a news story, saying essentially:  a “foreign vehicle was hit by another foreign vehicle, and both drivers were from out of state.”  Move on folks, nothing to see here. 

All three of us were white.  Some difference.

One percent of Vermont’s population is black.  We are basically a white state.  Our prison population, however, does not reflect our actual population. Eleven per cent of our prison population is black.  How did that happen?  You can only imagine what it must be like, if you’re not white, driving around on our rural roads through small communities that haven’t changed much over time, with a skin color that is obviously different from most everyone else’s.  Black among a landscape of white.  You must have come from elsewhere, and the odds are it is an elsewhere that may not be as good as this place.  Some lesser urban place, probably.  So, what, then, are  you here to do?   What is your purpose?  A few years ago a parent reported to the local police a suspicious person standing and watching a school soccer game, or maybe it was a baseball game, here in my little town.  That suspicious person turned out to be a person from India, hired to work at the local technical company.  He was different, you know, “different,” not black, but darker than us.

We can’t say that we no longer skirt racial issues.  Saying you don’t see race don’t mean much, as it only tries to make race invisible, as if no one knows, as if race is not even noticed when it very much should be taken into account.  A phrase in a recent column in the Addison Independent, our local liberal-minded county newspaper, jarred me. The column, usually philosophical ruminations about our history, is written by a former local professor and one-time town board member, and a liberal. A recent, and laudable, column was about historical racism in the era of eugenics.  This time the subject was the many achievements of Woodrow Wilson, a president who had a notable impact on this country’s history, much of it positive.  Wilson, about whom we have a heightened critical awareness these days, was also a southerner in both heritage and values, in word and in deed.  White supremacy values, believing, for example, that segregation was good for blacks and should be total. (Details can be found in The Atlantic, November 27, 2015 issue.)  While putting forward Wilson’s “high moral principles” and “great moral courage,” was it enough to preface this comment with “Notwithstanding his racial prejudice...” ?  Doesn’t this avoid having to say that he had, most unfortunately, a fatal flaw?  One that prevents his moral principles and moral courage from being “great”?  Can one “not withstand,” his racial prejudices?  Should we not condemn as strongly as we praise?  Do his accomplishments completely override his sin?

As protests continue now in this country, must we continue to hear “on the one hand” and “on the other hand” with regard to police behavior?  Is it necessary to flatter in order to condemn?  We know that many police departments have acted righteously, and where they have been peaceful toward protesters the protesters in turn have been peaceful. This is proof of the possible.  It requires a degree of humility.   People (read: police) resent being told they are not behaving appropriately, that they are part of a group that has been shown to be in the wrong. And honestly, their view of society may well be shaped by the crap they often have to deal with. Given all this, it doesn’t take much to upset the balance when people are angry: a shove, an angry curse, an aggressive gesture.  Worse yet, when police are togged out in riot gear with batons, pepper spray, “foam projectiles” and other quasi-military equipment, they are sending the message they are ready for battle.  It’s almost like incitement; when  you’re in battle dress the likelihood that there really will be a battle rises significantly.  How ironic, then, that in protesting brutality you may meet brutality.  

It’s not clear how this is going to end.  If it’s going to end.  Sure, the protests may stop, but the feelings that sparked those protests will not disappear. The sad thing about all this is that it’s hard to know what the outcome will be, since we are lacking the leadership it takes to respond in a major, positive way. Change may have to happen in many different places, bit by bit.  The other “outsiders,” immigrants, are not named as part of this particular movement. They too, are victims of brutality, and not just from police. 

Where do we end up? Does anyone imagine the Trump administration would unequivocally work toward racial equality, unity, and peace?  

I wish.

NO UPCOMING EVENTS

YOU HAVE NO UPCOMING EVENTS, REMINDERS, OR ALARMS...

Have you been noticing that responses to your emails arrive more quickly than they used to?  Even the one from that person who never used to write back until you forgot you'd ever sent the email, and then you didn't remember why you wrote it in the first place?  And the text you wrote that just sat there? And now your text exchanges move so quickly you don’t even bother to check the spelling? And how texting has become almost like real, you know, conversation? And then there's FaceBook. Which you never used to bother with and now you check it five times a day?  And you're looking at animal videos? Lots of them. And watching them all the way through? And looking for more?

Yes, this is where we are, some of us, many of us, with nothing better to do than indulging in introspection or cleaning closets.

Or whatever.

Stare up at a tree. Reflect on how short you are.

I am going to be upbeat, and I will not discuss our Prez whose worst impulses are on display.  Daily! I am not going to rage about his incompetent leadership, his anti-science, his lying, his self-serving egotism, his inconsistency, his unwillingness to take responsibility (except when he takes an illegal amount of it), and his merciless disregard of what it means to lead a nation.  I am going to ignore the virus toll, edging up now toward one million, the death toll over 50,000.

We are team USA. We lead the world.

A social distancing bash, Vermont style.

I'll put a photo here of something nice.

Near where I collected ramps*.  Behind the house.  No ramps in this picture.

I’ll tell a nature story.  There is a pair of ducks (drake and hen, respectively) that have been hanging out at the pond, mallards.  I've been keeping an eye on them ever since they took up residence here some time in March.  One day about two weeks ago I saw my dog Skyler chase away a female duck that had wandered close to the house. Odd behavior, I thought. Or brave bird.  It wasn't long before I found out what was going on.  Underneath a spruce, not far from the front door, there was a cozy nest, snuggled into the mulch, and it held ten jumbo-size eggs. Having a duck right near the front door, not to mention potential ducklings parading around, all in Skyler's territory did not seem like a good idea.  The nest needed to be moved.  So son-in-law Chris put on his gloves and moved the eggs, making an almost-as-nice nest near the pond and outside of Skyler's range.

The pond. Without ducks.

Wait, there’s more. About the ducks.  Since the nest move the ducks' lives have become increasingly mysterious to me.  I have many questions. The two seemed to spend half of the day at the pond, another part elsewhere. But where? I don't know.  Maybe they were just out of my sight somewhere nearby.  Did they know about the new nest? One day last week there were two ducks in the pond, drakes, both of them, one chasing the other, persistent.  A rival!  An hour or so later there was only a male, alone.  But which one?  Another day as Chris and Lesley stood by the front door, the male duck flew off.  Only minutes later they walked back down the hill to find the duck (same duck?) sitting on their front porch.  Not a likely spot for a duck, front porches. What was it doing there? And are there new eggs somewhere? The hen with either her new guy or her old guy, may have made another nest. That's my guess, because they're still hanging around.  Since it takes nearly a month (~28 days) before ducklings hatch it may be too early to know one way or another.  Then for two days I saw only the drake on the pond. Is the hen sitting on eggs?  Or have they parted company? There are mysteries.

The original nest.  No eggs.

Should we be surprised that the natural world carries on?  (The virus of course is also a part of the natural world, lest we forget.)  Note: Pollution is down, the use of fossil fuels hitting bottom, animals are roaming where humans usually fill the spaces. This is good.  For once, it’s the humans who are confined.

Animal. Semi-confined.  The one that chased the duck.

Uh, oh, Trump just spoke!  I need to interrupt for viral news. He said,

"Suppose that we hit the body with tremendous, whether it's ultraviolet or just very  powerful light, and I think you said that it hasn't been checked and you're going to test it.  Suppose you can bring the light inside the body.

"Then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in one minute.  Is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning? ... It would be interesting to check that."

(April 23, Trump, free associating after hearing that Covid-19 virus can be killed on surfaces with ultra-violet light and disinfectant.  Suggesting maybe we should drink bleach and burn ourselves with ultra-violet, get cancer?  Which, by the way–I'm talking cancer–Trump lawyer Giuliani suggested could be contagious: [If we're going to trace the virus,] "We should trace everybody for cancer, heart disease, obesity." )

Sorry, couldn't help that!


The natural world carries on. Thank goodness for that at least.




*Ramps, a delicate mix of scallion and garlic:

PLAGUE SPRING

World upside down. .

 A PLAGUE ON US

Plagues have been around as long as there has been a historical record.  There was plague in ancient Rome, and probably earlier still.  Stories of the bubonic plague that swept through Europe in the mid-1300’s are chilling, but they seem like stories of a time past.  We forget. There have been many waves of plagues since, and even the bubonic plague wasn't completely gone after the 1300's but returned in smaller waves thereafter. In the 16th century there was a mysterious “sweating sickness” (its vectors unknown to this day), and cholera, malaria, smallpox, MERS, SARS, ebola and, of course, the flu. The epidemic of 1918 known as the Spanish flu is the one we're most often reminded of. It didn't even orginate in Spain. It happened that during the First World War Spain was the only nation that printed news about the epidemic, other countries being under a news blackout.

Still, who would have imagined there would be an epidemic like this, much less a pandemic, in 2020?

Some people did. Actually quite a few people did.  

Seven years ago, 2013:

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that 75% of all emerging pathogens over the past decade are zoonotic diseases (infectious diseases caused by bacteria, viruses or parasites that spread from animals to humans; think ebola, think Covid-19) most of which are understudied.  

Two years ago, 2018:

Bill Gates warns that “If history has taught us anything, it’s that there will be another deadly global pandemic.” 

Trump attempts to cut $65 million from the CDC budget, a 10% reduction, and disbands its global health security team.  

One year ago, 2019:

The Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services runs a simulation called “Crimson Contagion” with a scenario that imagines a flu pandemic, an exercise that runs from January 2019 to August 2019.  Its sobering results are to be found in a draft October 2019 report that drives home how underfunded, underprepared and uncoordinated the federal government would be for a life-or-death battle with a virus for which no treatment exists.

The Trump administration proposes to cut federal spending on emerging infectious and zoonotic diseases by 20%.  Although Congress reinstates much of this funding with bipartisan support, the overall level of appropriations for relevant CDC programs is still 10% below what the US spent in 2016, adjusting for inflation. (Reference: globalhealthnewswire.com)

TIMELINE: 2020

It began here where I live on March 11.  When life began to be lived differently, that is. 

December 30, 2019

Dr. Li Wenliang sends a message to his former medical school classmates warning that a handful of patients in Wuhan had symptoms similar to severe acute respiratory syndrome and urges them to be cautious. Dr. Li is vilified for these comments by the Chinese government. I read about this much later on.

December 31, 2019

While New Year’s Eve is passing quietly, unbeknownst to me a report is passed on to the World Health Organization (WHO) from Wuhan, China.  It officially informs WHO about a cluster of 41 patients in Wuhan who have developed a mysterious form of pneumonia.  Most of those people are connected to the Huyanan Seafood Wholesale Market there.  

January 1, 2020

The Huyanan market closes.

January 7

Today Chinese authorities identify a new type of coronavirus and note its symptoms. 

It is an ordinary day here in Vermont, but even though it is deep winter there is not much snow on the ground. An ordinary day. 

January 11

The day after my birthday the first death from the new virus occurs in China. I read about this in the New York Times. I have dinner with family. 

January 12

The first case of this new virus is found outside of China, in Thailand. I read this in the news, too.

January 16, 17, 18, 19

I spend several days in New York City with daughters Lesley and Leah.  Lesley and I travel by train from Albany, leaving here in a snowstorm, and meet Leah who arrives by bus from Newburyport.  We do many of the things you do when you’re in the city:  We spend an entire day at the MOMA, see “Jagged Little Pill” on Broadway, go to a Comedy Club, wander SOHO, eat out.  It is the usual, fun kind of New York weekend.  New York is normal, great.

January 20

The first US case of this new virus appears in the state of Washington, a man who had been in China.  I read about it, but don’t give it much thought although it sounds a bit ominous.  It is nice to be back home. 

January 22 

Trump, in Davos, when asked about the new virus says, “We do have a plan and we think it’s gonna be handled very well, we’ve already handled it very well.”  And “It’s one person coming in from China.  We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.”

January 23

My book group meets for what would be the last time for a while. Our next meeting is supposed to be in February, but it is postponed because one member of the group will be in Barcelona around that time.  

January 24 

There is a regular board meeting of Mountain Health Center.  The virus epidemic is not on the agenda.  There is no reason it should have been at this time because the virus has not arrived. 

Trump says, “China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!” (Tweet)

January 30, 31 

WHO declares a public health emergency, and the next day, Trump bans foreign nationals if they were in China in the previous two weeks.  He says, “We’re working very closely with China and other countries, and we think it’s going to have a very good ending for us...that I can assure you.”

February 1

This epidemic still seems to everyone I know as a far-away event. It has no effect on anyone’s immediate plans.  This is the day grandson Hans graduates from Middlebury College.  Festivities fill the weekend. Hans will stay in Newburyport for about a week and then join his girlfriend in Madison, Wisconsin. He can work remotely, so his physical location doesn’t matter.  This will turn out to be fortuitous.

February 7

Chinese doctor Li the whistleblower who first spread the news in China that this was a dangerous virus, dies. The Chinese authorities put the blame for dismissing his concerns on local authorities.

Trump says, “Nothing is easy, but...we will be successful, especially as the weather starts to warm & the virus hopefully becomes weaker, and then gone. Great discipline is taking place in China, as President Xi strongly leads what will be a very successful operation.” (Tweet)

February 8

A US citizen in Wuhan dies, the first death of an American citizen. I am unaware that the speed of the epidemic has picked up.  This evening, a frigid night, the Friends of the New Haven Library’s major fundraising event takes place at the Lincoln Peak Vineyard.  The virus is not a topic of conversation.

February 10

Trump says, “...by April or during the month of April, the heat, generally speaking, kills this kind of virus.” (Meeting with state governors)

February 11 

WHO announces the name of the virus as Covid-19.

February 12

Cases of Covid-19 spike in South Korea.  

February 14

The snow is deep and soft right now and the weather beautiful on this winter day.  Friends have invited me to a sleigh ride and dinner later that evening at the Inn at Blueberry Hill.  The epidemic is not mentioned, neither is it in our thoughts.

February 19

The Iran outbreak begins. Virus coverage in the news is growing.

February 21 

Italy’s outbreak begins.  On this day I have company visiting from Bedford, Massachusetts, for the weekend.  The weather is beautiful again and we take a hike on the peninsula at Kingsland Bay. They leave on the 22nd. (I don't know this yet, but our next face-to-face will be via Zoom.)

February 23

US has 51 confirmed cases. Trump says, “We’re very much involved.  We’re very–very cognizant of everything going on.  We have it very much under control in this country.”

February 24

I go to my regular monthly Mountain Health Center Board meeting. The virus is not on the agenda.

Trump says, “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries. CDC & World Health have been working hard and very smart. Stock Market starting to look very good to me!” (Tweet)

February 26

Trump says, “I was really amazed, and I think most people are amazed to hear it: the flu, in our country, kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year. That was shocking to me. And, so far, if  you look at what we have with the 15 people and their recovery, one is–one is pretty sick but hopefully will recover–but the others are in great shape. But think of that: 25,000 to 69,000...”  
“And again, when you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done” (White House briefing)

February 27

Trump says,  “It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear.”

February 28

My family, my nearby neighbors, return from a week in Key West. They say they feel fortunate to have slipped in this vacation before the virus made its appearance.  Nevertheless, it was clear to them that it might be coming.

February 29

The Dana auditorium at Middlebury College is full as it usually is for these first-run–free!–films. I think I may go and see the one that’s on next week. 

The first death in the US from Covid-19 is reported. This doesn’t sound good, but it’s still far away, in Washington state.

Trump says, “And we've done a great job. And I've gotten to know these professionals. They're incredible. And everything is under control. I mean, they're very, very cool. They've done it, and they've done it well. Everything is really under control.” (Conservative conference in Maryland.)

March 3

Cases in Spain increase dramatically.

March 4

I go to the New Haven Library for our monthly meeting. We joke about never wanting to go on cruises. (Cruise ships have been hotbeds of Covid-19 spreading.) As long as we don't do that we're safe, right?

Trump says, “Large portions of the world are very safe to fly. So we don't want to say anything other than that.” (Meeting with airline executives)

March 6

At my house other members of the Mountain Health Executive Committee meet. The topic of discussion is not the virus, although it is in our thoughts. The chairperson has a bad cold, but we know it’s not the virus because Covid-19 hasn’t arrived in our area–yet. But there are few tests available, so of course no one knows for sure.

Trump says,  “Anybody that wants a test can get a test. ... The tests are all perfect.” (at CDC Headquarters)

March 7

My book group meeting is indefinitely cancelled. The member who went to Barcelona and her husband returned with colds. I wonder: Could it be Covid-19?  (They don’t get checked for Covid-19 until the end of this month by which time their colds are gone; they wait almost a week for results that come back negative.)

A friend and I go to a concert at the music barn in Brandon. We take a wrong turn so we are late and the only remaining seats are two extra chairs way in the back. The guitarist is from Italy, and I’m thinking about the virus raging there. He said he now lives in New Jersey, but I’m wondering how long he’s been away from Italy. We are the first to leave because my car is blocking other cars, so there is no chatting with the guitarist or anyone else on the way out. (In retrospect this seemed wise).

March 9:

Trump says, “So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!" (Tweet)

March 11

WHO declares the virus a pandemic.

Italy is on lockdown. Trump says, “To keep new cases from entering our shores, we will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days.”

March 13

A national emergency is declared in the US. There have been 40 deaths and there are 2,700 confirmed cases.

Trump says, “We have 40 people right now. Forty. Compare that with other countries that have many, many times that amount. And one of the reasons we have 40 and others have — and, again, that number is going up, just so you understand. And a number of cases, which are very small, relatively speaking — it's going up. But we've done a great job because we acted quickly. We acted early. And there's nothing we could have done that was better than closing our borders to highly infected areas.”

March 15

Social distancing begins.

March 17

A Federal plan is leaked that warns the pandemic could last months.

March  18

There is an earthquake in Utah. It knocks Gabriel’s horn from atop the Morman temple in Salt Lake City.  No one outside of Utah seems to be aware this has happened. 

Trump says Covid-19 is “the Chinese virus.”

March 19

China reports that the local spread numbers of Covid-19 cases are down.
Trump call Covid-19 "the Chinese virus" again.

March 20

Japan postpones the summer Olympics until 2021.
Trump says, "The world is paying a big price for what they (China) did."

March 22

An earthquake happens in Zagreb, Croatia. I was there on March 31, 2019.  This is yet another almost unremarked-upon event.  

March 23

Our Mountain Health Board meeting is held via Zoom. The agenda is almost solely Covid-19 and  MHC preparedness.  All medical encounters are now held remotely. Virus testing, however, is limited.  They apparently have sufficient Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).

New York City confirms 21,000 cases.

March 24

A Vermont stay-at-home order for the state (There are 95 cases in Vermont.)

My activities fade to near zero. Every day is like Groundhog Day except for changes in the weather. 

Trump says, re social distancing guidelines in parts of the country.” “I would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go by Easter.”  And: “I think Easter Sunday – you'll have packed churches all over our country.” (Fox News town hall)

March 26

US number of confirmed cases reaches 82,404, surpassing China and Italy.

March 29

Trump says, “The better you do, the faster this whole nightmare will end. Therefore, we will be extending our guidelines to April 30th to slow the spread. ... We can expect that, by June 1st, we will be well on our way to recovery. We think, by June 1st, a lot of great things will be happening.”

March 31

More than one-third of humanity is under some degree of lockdown.

80% of US is under lockdown in 35 states. There is no national lockdown order, however.

Trump says, “But it's not the flu. It's vicious. When you send a friend to the hospital and you call up to find out, how is he doing, it happened to me. Where he goes to the hospital, he says goodbye, sort of a tough guy, little older, little heavier than he'd like to be, frankly. And you call up the next day, 'how's he doing?' And he's in a coma? This is not the flu.” (White House briefing)

April 1

Nearing 1 million cases world-wide. The number of US cases leads the world.

Trump says, “Did you know I was No. 1 on Facebook? I just found out I was No. 1 on Facebook. I thought that was very nice for whatever it means.” (White House briefing)

April 3

Trump: “I said it was going away – and it is going away.” Also: “I would leave it (PPE) up to the Governors.” (White House briefing)  

Jared Kushner, now also in charge of the emergency supply chain says, “And the notion of the federal stockpile was, it’s supposed to be our stockpile.  It’s not supposed to be the states’ stockpiles that they then use.”

Re the CDC recommendation to wear masks, Trump says, “I don’t think I’m going to be doing it.”

April 4

The US now has 322,632 confirmed cases, triple those in Spain and Italy.

Re hydroxychloroquine sulfate (malaria drug with unproven effectiveness for Covid-19)*, Trump says, “What do you have to lose? Take it.” “I really think they should take it. But it’s their choice. And it’s their doctor’s choice or the doctors in the hospital.” And: “We’re going to be distributing it through the Strategic National Stockpile, we have millions and millions of doses of it.”  
And “There will be a lot of death” in “the toughest week.”  
And, regarding Easter, “Maybe we could allow special [gatherings] for churches.”  

Good luck to us all.  

* National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci, specifically warned what further studies are needed to determine whether the drugs touted by the president will work against COVID-19. We still need to do the definitive studies to determine whether any intervention not just this one, is truly safe and effective.”