Attend to the Mundane

A recent conversation:

[Uncle], [Spouse], and I were sitting at the table after dinner discussing how wobbly our giant cat tree has become from the boys constantly messing with it. I said we need to weight the bottom with something heavy to stabilize it.

"We should put a cinder block on it," said [Spouse].

"Yes, but how would you keep the boys from playing with it?" said [Uncle].

"I'd tell them not too," she replied.

Uproarious laughter from all three of us.

"Oh, I made a joke," said [Spouse].

So she called the boys over. "Boys, if Mom and Dad put something in the house and we told you it was super important that you leave it alone, that you could badly damage the house and serious injure yourselves if you messed with it, would you listen?"

[Older] thought for a second, then thoughtfully replied, "I think there'd be about a 60% chance we'd listen and 40% chance we wouldn't.

His honesty is wonderful. The truth he shared, not so much. But it is, unfortunately, probably accurate.

http://www.lunarbaboon.com/

This Lunarbaboon comic hits home.

Parent: "I'm exhausted all the time . . . I feel so worn down.

Doctor: "Hmm. It appears you have a serious case of kids."

Parent: "Oh no! What can I do?!"

(Kids: "He hit me! She hit me! Look at all the stuff we are breaking now!")

Doctor: "The best you can."

The apathy has been strong lately. In an effort to avoid being too upset about things--parenting, work, current affairs (the push against "critical race theory," Covid)--I've been working very hard to accept things as they come and maintain inner calmness. It seems my success in not feeling too negative about things has resulted in me not feeling too much of anything, though, and I haven't been experienced as much joy or passion or interest, either.

My work has been very different for the past 15 months, with at least another 6 to go. When the pandemic hit last March, everything closed. Things partially reopened a couple of months later, but nothing was normal. Then the building I work at began a major renovation, and most of the building closed. We have a small area at the front of the building where we can answer questions, provide a few computers, and allow patrons to pick up items they've requested. No other space, no books or collection, nothing else. With the spread of vaccinations this spring, much has returned to normal. But not us in our building; for us it's almost like the pandemic measures haven't changed because our building is so limited. No browsing patrons to help, no kids hanging out asking for reading recommendations, no storytimes or any of the other things that make our jobs joyful and meaningful. And still working from home a majority of the time.

I'm very lucky that is the case. Our younger boy, who just turned six at the start of the summer, is having problems getting along with others lately. The pandemic hit him especially hard. He's the lone extravert in our family of introverts, he didn't get his big turning-five birthday party as planned, he didn't get to start elementary school as expected, he lost some friends, and more. He's been struggling with all of it for a while, and for some reason things have really manifested this summer.

We used some of our pandemic stimulus money to enroll the boys in a variety of interesting day camps for the school vacation. About half of the weeks at a shelter at a park to allow them to be active, the other half a mix of art, theater, computers/coding, cooking, and science. A bunch of things they find interesting. Except the younger keeps getting sent home for being too aggressive with peers and being defiant with the adults who try to correct him. We drop him off each morning not sure if or when we might get a phone call to come pick him up. He's been uninvited from a couple of the camps midway through the week and sometimes our backup location doesn't work out either.

We're worried about those he might be hurting, about his mental and emotional health, about our mental and emotional health, about what others might be making of our parenting abilities, about what this might do to his long-term prospects if it continues (will he get stuck in a track for problem kids?), and more. One thing we aren't as worried about as we normally would be is my job, since my current schedule working from home allows me the flexibility to respond when needed for the most part. I'm not getting in trouble every time he does. So I'm very lucky my job is less involved and joyful than normal right now.

I'm mostly maintaining my apathy in response. A somewhat joyless, quietly anxious apathy, but calm acceptance for the most part.

This came across my feed last week in a particularly needed moment. It's not normally my kind of thing to share, but it was helpful to read.

I'm trying to keep it in mind, that this is just one moment in what will be his very long story.

I also keep returning to this passage from a new book I just read to the boys.

"That's tomorrow's task--one of tomorrow's tasks. When you can't sleep, the best thing to do is concentrate on life's daily tasks, to attend to the mundane. Tomorrow, I will attend to my business. I will go and get the key duplicated."

Attending to the mundane struck Frank as a very comforting notion.

"Can I go with you?" said Frank. "Can I help you attend to your daily tasks?"

"I suppose you may," said Eugenia.

"Thank you, Miss Lincoln," said Frank. . . .

"Attend to the mundane," he said to himself. "Do your daily tasks."

It's from Franklin Endicott and the Third Key by Kate DiCamillo. Frank, the main character, is a chronic worrier. He finds some help in this advise from an elderly neighbor.

My review:

I think I may have enjoyed this even more than my kids, though enjoy it they did--which is saying something since it has no silliness or adventure or other exciting outrageousness. It's a delightful little story of a boy getting over his worries about everything unknown by learning to appreciate the marvel of mysteries. And not criminal mysteries, but the mundane, everyday variety. As such, the book tells a very everyday story yet fills it with delight. I want to read it again now.

I also love this quote from it, though it's a more general one and not on the theme of this post so far.

Frank thought how mysterious the world was, how unexplainable and sometimes frightening. But to sit in the kitchen and read to someone he loved and to push back the darkness with a story--that was a wonderful thing.

Our nightly bedtime reading is indeed a wonderful thing.

A few other recent anecdotes about the kids. First, the younger:

I woke this morning to the boys rewatching The Mitchells vs. the Machines. They've both crawled into my lap while I drink my coffee to wake up. A moment of silence in the movie so everyone can digest the failure of the dad's heroic plan to save his family, into which [Younger] interjects, "He's just like you."

" . . . I fail?"

"No, you're fat."

And:

"[Younger], what do you want for breakfast?"

"I don't know. I'm not ready to decide yet."

"If you don't decide soon you're going to run out of time to eat."

He turns away, muttering to himself, "The pressure . . . "

This one is both of them, though it particularly illustrates the mind of the older.

"It's what's beyond infinity. It breaks the laws of physics."

That was [Older], to [Younger], a few moments after they joined us at the table for dinner. They'd been out playing in the yard, something imaginative. When we'd called them in to eat, they stopped for a few minutes to talk before coming over. I'd overheard something about assigning point values to things, like in video games.

I asked [Older] what he was referring to. "That's the weapon of the big boss in our game."

"Let me show you," said [Younger], darting away. He came back with a drawing. "See? It's been around forever. Cavemen drew this picture. It's the Tentacle of Doom."

Our efforts to encourage their creativity have definitely been fruitful. And we seem to be succeeding at steering the older away from evil genius to using his powers for good. My wife just shared this about him on Facebook.

I picked [Older] up from his first day at computer programming and gaming camp. His teacher (male, white, mid twenties) said [Older] was very impressive. "Considering he had never touched a computer before and is the youngest in the class by two years, he really rocked it today. He's a really sweet kid!". Can't tell you how nice it is to hear my kid complimented by total strangers. We don't have a computer and have not let our kids use one in hopes of prolonging their own creativity. I don't regret that choice.  Our generation are computer pioneers who got a week of computer programming in school once a year with LOGO until junior high (not counting Oregon Trail).

In contrast to his brother--and with much gratitude from our sanity--he seems to be really growing and maturing lately.

One more:

A tired and whiny [Older] after coming upstairs to rest from an afternoon spent with Uncle while he baked: "I want cupcakes."

[Spouse]: "You already had a cupcake."

[Older]: "I said 'cupcakes' not 'cupcake.' I want cupcakes."

[Younger]: "Good one, [Older]."

You might be able to guess from the color that those were for the Fourth of July.

A couple of other quotes from books I've just read. This one is, thankfully, not my current state, but I've been there and love the way she describes it. From Again Again by E. Lockhart:

I wish I could get a giant injection that would turn off my thoughts.

I would let a creepy doctor with a secret basement lab shoot a

random glowing substance into my ear if I knew it would stop me from feeling the way I do.

No, I feel like I can much more strongly identify with this one at the moment. From The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune:

"I'm just me," Linus said, unsure of where this was going. "I don't know how to be anyone but who I already am. This is how I've always been. It's not much, but I do the best I can with what I have."

And two short poems. Remember, your flaws are yours, you are not your flaws.

Karan Kapoor

WHAT IT IS IS WHAT IT IS NOT AND WHAT IT IS NOT IS WHAT IT IS

A picture of God is not God

the way a painting of water is not wet.

An image of the sun is not hot

and all those poems about poems

are just something else. Leaves, alive

or autumnal, time alone dictates.

Disembodied lips of a corpse

cast a shadow of a blackbird

with an impressive bill—

boldly, the shadow sings of its flaw

of colorlessness. Remember, your flaws

are yours, you are not your flaws.

A face behind a face makes the one

in front a mask. Affected love is not love.

Affected harshness is still harsh.

A woman with waves for hair

does not necessarily carry

an ocean inside her

head. Notice she begins

only as a bubble

of thought. Everything blue

was once green. A star is not a star

but its memory, its history. Looking back

isn’t wanting. Memory of love is not

love. Desire to help isn’t helping.

The winged-man also falls. The horse

in my head is not the horse

in your head. A dancing man

isn’t evidence for music. The eye you look

into is always looking right back.

A flying white bird is not always a sign

of freedom. Your face and flesh

is not your self. All that is lost

is somewhere found.

—from Ekphrastic Challenge

May 2021, Editor’s Choice

I don’t seem to care much about things these days.

Marilyn McCormick

CAR TROUBLE

He said my differential was gritty and grimy and

if I didn’t have it checked the whole thing could

fall apart or stop working. I didn’t know I had

one—a differential. Or where it was, or what it

looked like. I’m good at cleaning the things I can

see and the things I know about. It’s rained for two

days and I’ve waited for the clouds to leave, the

ones that are sitting on top of the hills, but today,

I said to hell with it and walked in the rain. The desert

doesn’t soak up the rain or hang onto it long. It

rushes over the hard pack, heading downhill to

set up flash floods on Route 140. I don’t seem to

care much about things these days. I feel disarmed,

hands hanging empty at my side, a little, you know,

indifferential.

—from Rattle #1, 1995

I mentioned earlier that things are improved regarding the Covid pandemic thanks largely to vaccinations. However, a variant is rapidly spreading that is beginning to do much harm to the unvaccinated population and seems able to mildly spread to even the vaccinated. Another thing to worry about. As someone said to us in a meeting earlier today, "The variant is coming for us."

The Delta Variant Isn't Just Hyper-Contagious. It Also Grows More Rapidly Inside You

After months of data collection, scientists agree: The delta variant is the most contagious version of the coronavirus worldwide. It spreads about 225% faster than the original version of the virus, and it's currently dominating the outbreak in the United States.

A new study, published online Wednesday, sheds light on why. It finds that the variant grows more rapidly inside people's respiratory tracts and to much higher levels, researchers at the Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

On average, people infected with the delta variant had about 1,000 times more copies of the virus in their respiratory tracts than those infected with the original strain of the coronavirus, the study reported.

In addition, after someone catches the delta variant, the person likely becomes infectious sooner. On average, it took about four days for the delta variant to reach detectable levels inside a person, compared with six days for the original coronavirus variant.

And some parts of the nation are this summer experiencing unprecedented heat waves. Global warming is coming.

Attend to the mundane. Do your daily tasks.

As I almost always I do, I feel the need to include a plea for a better world. Here are a couple of recent articles that have spoken to me.

What the Rich Don't Want to Admit About the Poor

The American economy runs on poverty, or at least the constant threat of it. Americans like their goods cheap and their services plentiful and the two of them, together, require a sprawling labor force willing to work tough jobs at crummy wages. On the right, the barest glimmer of worker power is treated as a policy emergency, and the whip of poverty, not the lure of higher wages, is the appropriate response. . . . 

This is the conversation about poverty that we don’t like to have: We discuss the poor as a pity or a blight, but we rarely admit that America’s high rate of poverty is a policy choice, and there are reasons we choose it over and over again. We typically frame those reasons as questions of fairness (“Why should I have to pay for someone else’s laziness?”) or tough-minded paternalism (“Work is good for people, and if they can live on the dole, they would”). But there’s more to it than that. 

It is true, of course, that some might use a guaranteed income to play video games or melt into Netflix. But why are they the center of this conversation? We know full well that America is full of hardworking people who are kept poor by very low wages and harsh circumstance. We know many who want a job can’t find one, and many of the jobs people can find are cruel in ways that would appall anyone sitting comfortably behind a desk. We know the absence of child care and affordable housing and decent public transit makes work, to say nothing of advancement, impossible for many. We know people lose jobs they value because of mental illness or physical disability or other factors beyond their control. We are not so naïve as to believe near-poverty and joblessness to be a comfortable condition or an attractive choice.

Most Americans don’t think of themselves as benefiting from the poverty of others, and I don’t think objections to a guaranteed income would manifest as arguments in favor of impoverishment. Instead, we would see much of what we’re seeing now, only magnified: Fears of inflation, lectures about how the government is subsidizing indolence, paeans to the character-building qualities of low-wage labor, worries that the economy will be strangled by taxes or deficits, anger that Uber and Lyft rides have gotten more expensive, sympathy for the struggling employers who can’t fill open roles rather than for the workers who had good reason not to take those jobs. These would reflect not America’s love of poverty but opposition to the inconveniences that would accompany its elimination.

Nor would these costs be merely imagined. Inflation would be a real risk, as prices often rise when wages rise, and some small businesses would shutter if they had to pay their workers more. There are services many of us enjoy now that would become rarer or costlier if workers had more bargaining power. We’d see more investments in automation and possibly in outsourcing. The truth of our politics lies in the risks we refuse to accept, and it is rising worker power, not continued poverty, that we treat as intolerable. You can see it happening right now, driven by policies far smaller and with effects far more modest than a guaranteed income.

Hamilton, to his credit, was honest about these trade-offs. “Progressives don’t like to talk about this,” he told me. “They want this kumbaya moment. They want to say equity is great for everyone when it’s not. We need to shift our values. The capitalist class stands to lose from this policy, that’s unambiguous. They will have better resourced workers they can’t exploit through wages. Their consumer products and services would be more expensive.” . . . 

For the most part, America finds the money to pay for the things it values. . . . It is in our power to wipe out poverty. It simply isn’t among our priorities.

I really wish we would choose to take care of each other more.

We’re Learning the Wrong Lessons From the World’s Happiest Countries

The happiness rankings have subtly encouraged an anxiety fit for our era of self-optimization: that somewhere, other people are doing things that make them much happier than we are.

This disturbing thought has contributed to the rise of a genre of lifestyle content that aims to help unhappy Americans emulate the daily practices and philosophies of happier places, whether that means taking a dip in frigid water or making your living room super-cozy. Wanting to copy the happiest people in the world is an understandable impulse, but it distracts from a key message of the happiness rankings--that equitable, balanced societies make for happier residents. In the process, a research-heavy, policy-oriented document gets mistaken, through a terrible global game of telephone, for a trove of self-help advice. . . . 

For the people who come up with policies and run countries, the lessons of the report are not shocking: People are more satisfied with their lives when they have a comfortable standard of living, a supportive social network, good health, the latitude to choose their course in life, and a government they trust. The highest echelon of happy countries also tends to have universal health care, ample paid vacation time, and affordable child care.

A central takeaway from nine years of happiness reports is that a wealthier country is not always a happier country. . . . 

Sachs views it as a reminder that once you’re comfortable materially, moderation is a healthier attitude than chasing more money and possessions.

And William Davies, the author of The Happiness Industry: How the Government and Big Business Sold Us Well-Being, observed to me that the list implies “a social understanding of happiness—something that happens between people,” which is a welcome alternative to the default assumption that individual people are responsible for their own misery. He also thinks it can show people which policies to vote for if they want to nudge their society in a happier direction. . . . 

Denmark and other happy countries embody “a different kind of prosperity, a more equal and shared prosperity, and I think things like hygge are a reflection of that norm,” he told me. “I think it’s something to emulate at an individual level, and something to propound at a political level.”

Taking forest walks and foraging for berries do sound delightful, but a focus on activities and habits reduces entire cultures to individual lifestyle trends and obscures the structural forces that make people satisfied with their lives. No quantity of blankets or candles is going to make up for living in an unequal society with a weak social safety net. The folly of fixating on local customs becomes even clearer if you consider the poverty and violence that are common at the bottom of the rankings.

The bolding in both articles is mine; emphasis added.

Of course, I know even as I share these articles--and all the others, with my own accompanying thoughts--that I am just like this fish.

False Knees

I make these blog posts for me, not for any impact I think they might have.

And, even as my efforts to remain in a state of calm acceptance keep the swing of the metronome from getting too extreme, this meme someone created is completely, absolutely accurate.

Attend to the mundane. Do your daily tasks.