Continued Confessions

In Chaos and Confusion

I couldn’t resist the alliteration this morning. All sentient beings are currently being affected by the Mad King and his minions. Honestly, my first thought was “insider trading” and I immediately remembered Martha having gone to jail for something far less egregious, in my layperson’s opinion. Could she have been made a scapegoat because of her gender?

Before getting out of bed, I spent some time reading several experts here on Substack (including Georgia Fisanick who introduced me to Belle on YouTube) and many other links to even more reports from television sources. I now have a rudimentary inkling of what’s happening. I also watched a great video from WIRED that laid out all of Musk’s tentacles across the globe. That was fascinating—particularly because he appears to be manipulating from behind the scenes in this fiasco (including using his little brother as a mouthpiece?). Anyway, enough of that mess. My daffodils and forsythia bushes are in full bloom and ripe for the picking, so yellow abounds indoors and out.

And my trip to the City was a very interesting break from my regular routine. The first treat was having the front seat in the huge OurBus which whisked me from New London to New York City exactly as promised. I used to personally drive myself that particular route many years ago, and it was heartwarming to be afforded the front seat because of my age! The driver handled the monster vehicle as smoothly as I could ever have wanted (and traffic was lighter because it was Sunday morning). Then my journey from the Eastside to the Westside was very reminiscent of prior travels. I chose to walk to the subway and use that mode of transportation. Unfortunately, a few times my age and various infirmities caught up with me, and I had to stop to rest in the middle of a particularly onerous flight of stairs. But people stopped and asked if they could help, and I assured them that I would be okay. I’ve always found New Yorkers to be friendly, contrary to rumors.

The medical visit resulted in a rather blasé wait and see prescription. And I have to say that recently I have felt that some doctors have the attitude that “what else did you expect at your age?” I thought about the immense effort afforded to treat the Pope recently. Did anyone bring his age into the conversation? [By the way, thank you, Kareem, for including some thoughts on this topic in your Substack on Tuesday.]

Anyway, coming home I again used the subway but this time to Grand Central Station where the fabulous MetroNorth trains depart very regularly. Without planning ahead, I managed to get a train right away, and then connected seamlessly with the Shoreline East service which brings me all the way home. The best neighbor in the world picked me up from the station in her brand new car, and I arrived home in time for tea.

While in the City, I also met a wide variety of people who made my visit even more pleasant. I have a tendency to talk to strangers, and meeting Dan from New Hampshire as he stood outside another enormous bus added to my belief in the goodness of people. He drives that long route three times a week and spends time at home in between with a new doggie. One of the medical personnel I saw was Oumou, a gorgeous young woman from Guinea, West Africa, who has been here for nine years, with only two visits home to see her parents. We commiserated a little about distant family. And the receptionist at the office had the delightful name of Fawn, so I took pleasure in wishing her goodbye as I left.

I have been thinking about the fact that in England we used to call those big buses charabancs (or “sharra-bang” in colloquial British English as Wikipedia informs me). We knew them as buses that brought holidaymakers to the Isle of Man. Fascinating how your memory works—or doesn’t sometimes. It turns out that other people’s memories may differ sharply from mine after all, but that is not an issue when I live in the present, a day at a time. And I have been particularly reminded of that while reading A New Pair of Glasses by Chuck C. which involves a lot of history about Alcoholics Anonymous and its founding. It turns out that Chuck C. was a member in Laguna Beach, California, where I arrived at 19 and met the man with whom I planned my deflowering (I think I’ve shared a few details about this before). But the idea of being blind then seeing is the opposite of what I may be currently facing. And I want to learn how to go in the other direction gracefully.

My final thought this morning is to share from my breakfast table the bottle of Golden Blossom Maple Syrup (copyright John Paton, Inc. Doylestown, PA) which says that it is a “product of U.S.A. and Canada” proudly on the label. Ah, the good old days . . .

RESIST ALWAYS

TTFN