Michele Leohart is an administrator in the DEA and, maybe, she is stoned and that is her excuse for her ridiculous answers. But I doubt it, I think the real reason is the Washington culture that actually prevents honesty and introspection. In this case, thanks to Congressman Jared Polis for doing what our Congresspeople should actually be doing.
Summer Solstice 2012
Michele planned the return from her trip to Ireland so she could be there for the solstice (and spend some time with her step-sister). Yesterday, she went to see the Drombeg stone circle near Baltimore and liked it so much she went back this morning at 5 AM for the Summer Solstice Sunrise. Yesterday, it was clear and green and very Irish and this morning, after getting up in the middle of the night and driving for an hour, the sunrise was fogged in and – I guess – still very Irish.
Of course she had her iPhone and, of course, she had her handy App that tells her where the sun is coming up – or the moon, or Jupiter – and, of course, it works in Ireland.
As an aside, I have never been to Ireland and have no connection with it but I do know all the Counties around Baltimore; County Cork, County Kerry, County Clare, County Limerick, County Tipperary, County Kilkenny, County Waterford. I don’t think that there is any other place in the world where the names are that famous. Not Paris, not New York, not even London. It is very strange. End aside.
Twenty three and a half hours later, I was watching the Summer Solstice Sunset
cast its alpenglow on the buildings of San Francisco.
As the light faded, wisps of fog came in softening the scene and dropping the temperature. A very San Francisco Solstice.
Happy Father’s Day 2012
Alfred J. Stern 1906 -1968
How strong you looked standing in the shower,
with your barrel chest, your solid body, your big purple cock.
How weak and boyish I felt, with my puny body and toy weeny.
How ashamed I was when you laughed at my chicken breasts.
How trivial I felt.
But that was before I knew of your pain. Your isolation. Your failed dreams.
You were like a god. A gladiator. Invincible.
The hair on your arms was like a bear.
When you kissed me, your face rasped like a file.
How I felt I disappointed you. I was only a boy, worse, a mama’s boy.
When you didn’t talk to me, I knew it was my weakness.
But that was before I knew of your isolation. Your failed dreams.
I felt you didn’t protect me, because I wasn’t worth protecting.
Didn’t include me because I wouldn’t ever be a man.
But that was before I knew of your failed dreams.
How hard it must have been. Looking like a man outside.
Being afraid to even see your own fear.
I know. I have tried to hide my fear. I have been afraid to look weak.
Trying to show only strength. Thinking I have none. Thinking I am lying.
How lonely it must have felt. Hoarding those fears. Feeling you are alone.
Knowing only your own self loathing. Rejecting your own pain. Your own imperfection.
I know. I’ve lived in my own nest of self hate.
I’ve lived without accepting myself enough to look inside.
I’ve lived alone. Hiding. Afraid.
How weak you were. How afraid. How hard it must have been to pass on your strength. Your teaching.
I love you, Daddy. For your gifts. Fear, isolation, strength. The insight to know the difference.
I love you for your sacrifices.
Epiphylums
We have had a couple of hot days, and – it seems like all of sudden – our Epiphylums are blooming. Epiphylums are epiphytic cactus. Epiphytic meaning they are arborael; they grow in trees like some orchids and bromeliades, but are not parasites. The plants we have are from tropical areas of the Americas and are not species but have been hybridized for their flowers which I am normally against (because I am a species snob).
The flowers are spectacular with flowers up to 4″ across.
Everything I believe about inequality is wrong
Every time I read about the rich getting richer and everybody else slowly getting poorer, I get pissed. Every time I read about Bain Capital buying a company – say KB Toys, worth $302 million by putting up $18 million and borrowing the rest – driving it into staggering debt and, then, bankruptcy, and walking away with a an $85 million dividend taxed at a special low rate, I get hot, sweaty, pissed. It seems so unfair, first the making of money by closing down a company, by eliminating jobs, and then, to compound the unfairness, to pay less taxes than the people who work for a living.
It is unfair, but when I drive by Pyramid Lake and see the RVs crowding the shore, I am beginning to think that the unfairness may be better for the planet. Actually, I know it is better for the planet and I am just beginning to admit it.
In 2005, because of a long drought and for other – more endemic – reasons, the lake level of Lake Powell dropped low enough to expose the Cathedral in the Desert. Michele and I went to Lake Powell to go see it. We were blown away, but I was even more blown away by the long line of 4wheel drive trucks towing elaborate ski-boats at the boat ramp. It was an early weekend in May and the line to get in the lake must have been longer than a mile, one 4X4 after another each with a trailer carrying a heavy duty skiboat. Each rig owned by a middleclass American living the Dream.
When I hear about Scott Walker busting unions, I get enraged, but I am starting to think he is right. Union people, the vaulted and abused middle class of the American Dream, make too much money – well, to be more accurate, they don’t make too much money, they spend too much money, they buy too much shit – and it is not good for the long term, health of our planet.
In the Scott Walker case, it is not like the state workers will starve. They will still have jobs, they will just get paid less and get a smaller – maybe much smaller – retirement. Yes, they might not be able to have a big 4X4 and a skiboat, but they will still be wealthy by almost any historical measure. The tenants of modern trailer parks live in more, real, luxury than Roman rulers. Every one of them has access to unbelievably good health care, they all have cars, they all have televisions and heated houses, and – probably – air conditioning. Even after their Unions have been busted and the American Dream is dead, the workers Scott walker went after will be living a life of almost unimaginable wealth by even 1960’s standards.
That is not to say that Scott Walker isn’t a asshole; he is, after all, commanding others to sacrifice without having to sacrifice himself, asking others to sacrifice while probably enriching himself. If the test of a moral assertion is where its burden falls, Scott Walker flunks. That is my problem with conservatives, they are always demanding change that makes life harder for others, never for themselves. But that doesn’t change the basics; we can’t continue to live like this.