It’s 2021. Let’s Review: January, Pre-Pandemic

So it is another new year. I am having a hard time saying “Happy New Year” because, honestly, it isn’t. I hear everyone saying “Thank God 2020 is over!” but there’s been no miraculous, overnight transformation of the situations in which we all find ourselves. The Atrocity is still in the White House; McConnell still makes the Senate the Graveyard for legislation; COVID-19 runs rampant through the planet; here in the U.S., too many people refuse to wear masks or maintain a safe distance from others; people are hungry and homeless and losing health and hope. I think I shall feel a new year has started at noon on the twentieth, when Joe Biden takes the oath of office and the Atrocity in the White House has left the building. Maybe the end of the year will be happy, but right now, all I can wish us all is that we survive the first part of 2021. Then let’s see where we are.

Meanwhile, I have been going through my photos from last year. I take photographs as a way to remind myself to notice the world, to see the beauty, the memorable, the stirring aspects my small space, as a way to distract myself from my depression. Sometimes it even works. I have monkeys-and-typewriters¹ approach to photography: I figure that if I take enough photos, statistically, some of them have to be half-way decent. It’s one of the few theories I have that seems to pan out.

If you like, come with me on a review of what I chose to see through my cameras last year. Here are some of my photos from January. I have come to think of it as the Pre-Pandemic Month, because even though SARS-CoV-2 was making its still insidious way into almost every corner of every country, we had no idea that there would soon be a pandemic. I was too busy hoping against experience that our president’s impeachment would lead to his removal from office.

 

 One the first day of 2020, I went out into the world beyond my yard. I saw mountains,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

and farms,

 

 

 

 

and the ponds along my bus route.

 

 

 

There were graceful wisps of clouds and the moon up early in the day-lit sky.

 

 

I was out with my family, and we lingered until evening. The mall was still decorated for the season,

 

 

and the star that’s lit on the the mountainside every year was still shining over the town.

 

 

 

Our tradition is to visit the Boulder Book Store on New Year’s to take advantage of their Readers’ Guild inventory sale. We did not go this year, and I find missing that visit to my happy place has sharply reminded me of how my life has changed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We went out for dinner. We sat inside a restaurant. We didn’t worry about it.

 

 

 

I tracked the phases of the moon.

 

 

 

I tracked the changes to the pond (note the ice and all the geese).

I watched the sun set. And I watched the moon rise…

and set.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AND THEN — I went to the Monet Exhibit at the art museum. It was astonishing —

especially the details.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I saw a whole — shoot, I can’t find the word (stupid aphasia; I’ve had it since the time I was on Prednisone years ago) — phase? group? category? set? of Monet’s work of which I had been completely unaware: the winter scenes:

 

 

I don’t have the artistic vocabulary to describe techniques or effects properly, but what struck me about these paintings were the co-existing qualities, the way they were simultaneously subdued yet vibrant, misted in frost while brightened by it, exciting and calming. The chill of the icy blues was almost palpable, but so was the warmth of the coral tones.

Some of these qualities were apparent in other paintings,

 even those in sunny regions,

 and foggy climes,

and temperate zones.

 

 

 

 

And of course there were water lilies. There none of the truly great and famous water lily paintings, but the ones in the exhibit were still breath-taking.

One prosaic note about the exhibition: the paintings were so numerous and the galleries so extensive that it took up two levels in the museum and, half-way through, visitors were allowed to take a bathroom pass, leave the exhibit, and return. I’ve never been to a show where one was allowed back in after leaving. My only complaint about the experience is that the museum was very firm in its policy of not letting me take any of the paintings home.

I haven’t figured out how to make movies work in my site, but I think if you click the link below, it will show you one of the “trees” on display in downtown Denver that evening:

Holiday “Tree”

Eventually the moon (Wolf Moon) got full.

It rose in a burnt-yellow colour, but brightened as it climbed the sky.

One of the books I got at the Book Store sale was Take Me With You, by Andrea Gibson:

I’m not entirely sure to what genre it belongs; it was on a sale cart. But several of the author’s observations stayed with me. This one seemed apt enough when I read it, but in retrospect, it now seems absolutely prescient:

I think, after last year and the beginning of this, we are going to have to learn to to say this and then find ways to speak our revival.

Some random shots of what caught my eye:

 

 

 

 

We took a trip to San Diego for a family gathering.

(“Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away, ere break of day,
To find our long-forgotten gold.”
—J.R.R. Tolkien)

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

And spent a bit of time at the beach (though not long enough).

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

               

I saw this person walking along the beach for quite a while, collecting things in a basket. I wish I had known how to approach her (?) and ask about her gatherings without being forward. I feel there’s a story in this photo.

 

 

          

  

Look where we went:

Proof I really was on the Surprise.

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, it was being renovated, so I didn’t get a lot of good pictures.

 

 

 

 

Back over the Misty Mountains…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

to the familiar light of home.

We attended the symphony. It’s almost frightening to think how dangerously reckless we were to go somewhere in such a crowd, but, like almost everyone, we had no idea was coming.

   

There were the usual interplays of light and shadow, real and metaphorical,

     

sunrises,

sunsets.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The pond stayed frozen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The moon waned.

 

 

 

 

 

And January was over.

___________________

1.”The Infinite Monkey Theorem is a proposition that an unlimited number of monkeys, given enough typewriters and an infinite amount time, will eventually produce a particular text, such as Hamlet or even the complete works of Shakespeare.

Random Ruminations on Depression

Preamble
I want to take back the word ruminate. The Online Etymology Dictionary explains that the word “ruminate (v.)” dating from the 1530s, means “’to turn over in the mind,’ also ‘to chew cud’ (1540s), from Latin ruminatus, past participle of ruminare ‘to chew the cud; turn over in the mind,’ from rumen (genitive ruminis) ‘gullet,’ of uncertain origin.” Merriam-Webster Online gives the definition of ruminate as

transitive verb
1: to go over in the mind repeatedly and often casually or slowly
2: to chew repeatedly for an extended period
intransitive verb
1: to chew again what has been chewed slightly and swallowed : chew the cud
2: to engage in contemplation : REFLECT

But psychology — and in general I have real respect and genuine gratitude for the healing and support psychology and psychotherapists provide; if I kept a gratitude journal, my therapist’s name would be on every page — has come near to ruining this abundantly apt word that perfectly expresses the way many of us need or choose to take the time to ponder and deliberate rather than hasten to judge or get embroiled in the consequences of an ill-considered decision. Psychology, as a field, has decided ruminate should mean obsessively thinking about whatever is bothering one, over and over, round and round… ¹

 

I think one of the reasons that this definition has become popular, not only among psychologists, but in the general public as well, is that we have such short attention spans and have come to prize speed over all else. We rush to embrace technology that robs us of our privacy, we don’t stay to watch the credits after a movie (unless there’s an added scene), we expect to know the results of every election before the votes are all counted.

 

Take a breath, people.  

 

Being ruminative used to be a positive attribute, one that indicated one was a careful, thoughtful person, not inclined to fling one’s self pell-mell off a cliff. Now it is a weakness, a character flaw that indicates one brings one’s misfortunes upon one’s self because one can’t control one’s thoughts. 

Join me in my mission. Let’s rescue ruminate. Start using it in its proper sense. Fling it with abandon into your philosophical conversations: “I was ruminating upon the meaning of life the other day and wondering just what 42 really has to do with it.” If someone tries to push you into making a snap decision, say, “You know, in order to give you the thoughtful answer you

https://pixabay.com/photos/pensive-female-woman-window-staring-580611/

deserve, I need to ruminate on that for a day or two.” When next asked to describe yourself, pause for a moment,  then declare, “I am an attentive, measured sort of person with a ruminative cast to my mind.” (Just don’t tell anyone you’re a ruminant. That will totally undermine our goal.) 

And after we save ruminate, we’re coming back for you, enable.
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Every so often, the New Yorker slips a suggestion for an archived article into the inbox of my e-mail. That how I came across Andrew Solomon’s article, “Anatomy of Melancholy,” that appeared in New Yorker’s January 12, 1998 issue. It’s a pretty harrowing description of the depths down to which depression can pull person and of the biases that still pertain when it comes to admitting to others or to ourselves that we have a mental illness and, worse, might be so “weak” as to need chemical (or electrical) interventions. As I moved through the essay, I came upon this proffered bit of wisdom:

Accuracy of perception is not an evolutionary priority. Too optimistic a world view results in foolish risk-taking, but moderate optimism gives you a strong selective advantage. “Normal human thought and perception,“ Shelley Taylor writes in her 1989 book, Positive Illusions, “is marked not by accuracy but by positive self-enhancing illusions about the self, the world, and the future. Moreover…these illusions are not merely characteristic of human thought; they appear actually to be adaptive.” As she notes, “The mildly depressed appear to have more accurate views of themselves, the world, and the future than normal people. [They] clearly lack the illusions that in normal people promote mental health and buffer them against setbacks.”

Charles Darwin
Photo by hulki-okan-tabak-SKadYI4E7OM-unsplash

So — why are those of us with depression and accurate perceptions the ones who are mentally ill, while the “normies” with their illusions are the ones who are considered sane? Why are we the ones who are seen as less evolved? Am I the only one who thinks this assessment is a little bit off?

************************************

  In a recent car commercial, actor and apparent guru Matthew
McConaughey ruminates (see how easy it is just to slip the word right into a sentence?) out loud about the process of identity formation.

McConaughey muses

“Knowin’ who we are is hard — it’s hard. Eliminatin’ who you
are not, first, and you’re gonna find yourself where ya need to be.”

OK, first: shouldn’t the thrust of the first sentence — the search for identity — lead to a statement about finding out who one is rather than where one is? I guess that’s what happens when one infuses manufactured sagacity into an advert for a vehicle. And never mind the lack of parallel structure in the second sentence.

But what I keep thinking is, “What if we, as is recommended by Mr. McConaughey, eliminate all the people we are not, only to realize there’s no one left?” That’s kind of who-where I keep finding myself.

*********************************

An ethical dilemma: At the recommendation of a friend, I picked up Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, by Daniel G. Amen. M.D. I haven’t read very far into it, but so far there are some sensible observations about the practicality of having one’s brain scanned for damage so one knows whether medical or psychotherapeutic remedies are most likely to be beneficial. However, on page twenty-nine, our friend the doctor discusses things that hurt the brain and things that help the brain. Under malign influences, Dr. Amen notes that “even spending time with unhealthy people [is] bad for the brain.” OK: I can see how that can work; we are the company we keep.

In the next paragraph, Dr. Amen lists things that can boost the brain. This list includes the point that “In many ways, the best thing you can do for your brain is to spend time with healthy people. As we will see, they are contagious. I often say the fastest way to get healthy is to find the healthiest person you can stand and then spend as much time around him or her as possible.” That also makes sense.

Aside from the difficulties of fulfilling this prescription in our COVID-19-riddled age — and you may already see the problem here — consider this: Let’s say I’m a healthy person. I know an unhealthy person, someone with, say, depression, someone who would immensely benefit from spending time with me. Yet if I do spend time with that person, I’ll be engaged in an activity that will be detrimental to my own grey matter. On the other hand, if I choose to protect myself by shunning the depressed person, I’m selfishly depriving her or him of my beneficial “contagion” and preventing that person from attaining the flourishing cerebrum she or he deserves. (Unless, of course, that person has been ruminating. In that case, she or he deserves all the melancholy that infests her or his soul. [That’s an example how NOT to use the word ruminating.]) I’m either allowing harm to come to myself or withholding aid from another, which makes me a pretty lousy human being, and knowing that I’m a pretty lousy human will depress me.

Now let’s imagine that I am the unhealthy person, and I know a tremendously healthy person, in whose salubrious presence I never fail to rally. I have a lot of time on my hands. I easily could spend days with this person and notably sharpen my dulled mental functions and ameliorate my debilitating mood. However, by latching on to this bloom-imparting person, I will be causing harm to that individual’s well-being and will likely disrupt her or his equilibrium. That would make me an insensitive parasite, sucking the life out of someone for my own ends, and being such a draining leech would make me feel horrible and depressed.

So what to do? I hate lose-lose, damned-if-you-do-or-don’t, caught-between-Scylla-and-a-hard-place options.

**********************************

And then Will Wheaton put this up on his Blog:

報復性熬夜
Revenge Bedtime Procrastination, which has a much more beautiful name in Chinese (the literal translation for revenge bedtime procrastination means “suffering through the night vengefully.”), is a phenomena unique to people who feel out of control in their daily lives, so we refuse to go to sleep early, to exert some control over our lives, and to enjoy some quiet time alone, when the rest of our people are sleeping.

I should confess, straight up, that I am, by nature, a night owl. It runs in the family. But I love both this concept and its name. Between the depression and the M.E. and the State of the Union, I’m having an increasingly hard time getting any sleep. I just wish being AWAKE YES I’M AWAKE YES I DO KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS OH ISN’T THAT A LOVELY SUNRISE? would wreak some actual vengeance on the conditions and people who are responsible for my near-insomnia.

*****************************

Image by Stefan Keller from Pixabay https://pixabay.com/photos/fantasy-face-branches-woman-3317298/

I hope, dear reader, that my ruminations provide some conceptual cud for your synapses to masticate at the pace of your choosing. And don’t forget: enable is still waiting for us…
_____________________________________

  1. Margaret Wehrenberg, Psy.D. “Rumination: A Problem in Anxiety and Depression,” Psychology Today (on line). April 20, 2016.

#30Inks30Days 3 April, 2020

Day Three of using 30 Inks in 30 Days to distract me from the tragic, global disaster of COVID-19 and the national political disaster of our Federal Government.

Darkness brought to you by Diamine Shimmertastic Colbalt Jazz. I thought this ink caught the way a sudden darkness would hold some of the shine and gleam of the briefly obscured day light.

Inktober Day Four: Some mists begin to clear…

Inktober Prompt: Freeze
Goldspot Prompt: Blood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, Bridget! 

You know how I abhor a cliché, but I must tell you that your letter made my blood freeze. Truly, I felt it run cold in my veins. 

Thank heavens Dr. Morgan was able to get rid of your brain fog. Funny how it took a doctor to see clearly that you needed a cup of strong tea!

While I understand your tale now, I would credit such a story from no one but you.I do not know if we’ll need to involve anyone else in this perilous conundrum, but if we do, it will be of tremendous value to have Dr. Morgan’s corroboration. 

It must have been terribly unnerving to hear your usually patient papa speak to you in a voice so unlike his own in timbre, tone, and pitch. You’re right: I have never heard him raise his voice either, not even when he caught you packing to run away to prove, at eleven, that you could too take care of yourself.

If only his querulousness were due to his advancing age and poor health. It seems indeed that some thing has taken over your father’s mind, even if it manifests at intervals.

I know you are worried that Dr. Morgan’s tests may have a deleterious effect on  your father’s health, but I think that you have to trust her. Whatever is affecting him must be taking a toll on his body and his mind.

But no matter how upset he gets, do not let your father persuade you to return to the woods. Pretend, if you must, to accede; let him see you in your jacket and gloves; open and close the front day and walk to the corner store so you come back wreathed in scents of fresh autumn air. 

I must think further about the venomous fog and your vague recollections about believing yourself to be bait. Have you remembered anything further?  How you came by that idea? For what you might be the enticement? Or to what purpose?

Sit tight, Bridget. As you know, Dr. Morgan comes to me tomorrow and I shall keep her to tea after she finishes my examination. As soon as she pronounces me well enough to leave home, I shall come to see you (how plagued you must feel, caught between an ailing father and a foundering friend!).

I shall send you a note tomorrow by the good doctor; I hope together she and I will be able to hit upon a course of useful action. Watch out for yourself, and keep away from shadows. Give your father, when he is himself, my fondest regards, and hoard for yourself the best of my

Friendship and love,
Hannah

Inktober 2019 Day Three: Many Questions are Raised…

Inktober Prompt: Bait
Goldspot Prompt: Venom

Bridie, Bridie, Bridie,

You must calm down! You write in such a panic that I can hardly decipher your meaning. It has always been so: Remember when we were were small and you tore up your basement steps all in a state, so terrified you couldn’t form words? You tugged my sleeve until I crept down the stairs with you, only to find a “monster” made of a mop, some towels, a bucket, and the ambient moonlight?

Don’t be upset; I’m not implying that you’re inventing monsters now. But you tend to be less than articulate when you are frightened. 

I shall tell you what I’ve extrapolated from your note, then you will tell me how well I understood your letter, and then we shall figure out what to do.

So: two days ago (is that right?), while caring for your father (that part is clear), he became, you wrote, “agitated.” What do you mean by that? Was in in pain, angry — disturbed in his mind, in his faculties? You say, “He insisted with a strange urgency that I go for a walk, out in the woods where we used to play>” What was strange about his desire for you to get some air? Could he be feeling ill at ease that you spend so much time in his chamber and might he merely wish for you to care for yourself by visiting the scene of so many of our innocent games? Has Dr. Morgan noticed a change in his demeanour?

Now, Bridget, I come to the part that most puzzles me. To calm your father, you agreed to the walk (good) and strolled down the path to the pond (how well I know that lane!). As you walked, you told me, “the trees became strange.” In what sense, Bridget dear? Odd? Your tone implied that the trees, the ones we climbed, that grew as we grew among them, were unfamiliar. But how could that be?

And then your story becomes strange indeed. You wrote that a fog, a “miasma, a mist full of venom,” filtered through the trees. No — wait; you write that it emanated from the trees. (How could that happen?) It was, you maintain, an unnatural fog, one that thickened behind you and, you seemed to say, breathed a venom that drove you, running, toward our pond. Please explain how a mere fog was “venomous.” Was it truly poisonous or, perhaps, was it infected by your fears for your papa, by the sometimes fetid air of the sick room? I do not doubt you as much as it might seem, but I want to be sure I understand what you’re telling me.

Bridie, you end so wildly!: “Bait! Bait! Nothing but bait! My skirt covering nose and mouth, I ran ran ran. Instinctive feet, somehow home. And a note to you.”

If you wrote me after such a shock, I can well understand why your earlier note carried such a pall with it, a pall that has only grown heavier after reading your letter today. Again, I urge you to write swiftly back to your

Steadfast friend,
Hannah

Inktober Day Two: A sense of foreboding steals in…

Inktober Prompt: Mindless
Goldspot Prompt: Chill

Inktober Day Two

2 October, 2019

Well, Bridie,

As happens so often, our letters must have crossed in the post. I was pleased to see it; I was expecting your recipe for pumpkin soup — goodness knows I’ve asked for it often enough!

Your missive started out well enough; I am pleased that your dear papa is improving. But, Bridget, as I read on, I confess a chill brushed through my soul and left a pattern of ice crystals there. I can hardly say why. There seemed to be a creeping, mindless aura to your words that has settled over my own brain like a living mist and has quite put me out of countenance.

Write back at once to either reassure or confide in

Your anxious friend,
Hannah

P.S. And please don’t forget the soup recipe!

Inktober Day One: And so it begins…

Inktober Prompt: Ring
Goldspot Prompt: Mystery

Inktober Day One

Dear Bridget,

Autumn is good and finally here. For weeks, the flowers & trees have seemed still & quiet  — waiting. But now they begin to ring out with glory and colour. It started with the drifting, spinning leaves of the locust, floating down like slow-motion largesse, looking like the tinkling of a wind-chime in a lazy breeze.

But now the reds & oranges ring out on the trees and bell out that ‘Fall has come!’ in deeper tones than even the aspen can manage. There is a mystery to the liminal seasons, a mystery of which I never tire.

You are laughing, I’m sure, at my florid prose, but I am even more sure you will forgive and indulge

Your tedious friend,

Hannah

Inktober 2019, or How to Jump Start Your Journaling

And on a similar note, if #30inks30days interests you, then join in for Inktober: 31 Days, 31 Drawings. Inktober was started in 2009 by Jake Parker “as a challenge to improve my inking skills and develop positive drawing habits. It has since grown into a worldwide endeavor with thousands of artists taking on the challenge every year.” The rules are pretty simple:

  • 1) Make a drawing in ink (you can do a pencil under-drawing if you want).
  • 2) Post it*
  • 3) Hashtag it with #inktober and #inktober2019
  • 4) Repeat
  • Note: you can do it daily, or go the half-marathon route and post every other day, or just do the 5K and post once a week. What ever you decide, just be consistent with it. Inktober is about growing and improving and forming positive habits, so the more you’re consistent the better.

That’s it! Now go make something beautiful.

*Post it on any social media account you want or just post it on your refrigerator. The point is to share your art with someone. 🙂

The site has links to tutorials and advice on tools and how to “do Inktober.”

In addition, Goldspot pens (and I have no affiliation with either Inktober or Goldspot) is running an Inktober 2019 Giveaway with writing prompts for those who prefer sentences to drawings or who want to do both. Tom Oddo writes that “In the creative spirit of this challenge, we are broadening the scope of Inktober to include writers as well as artists. To inspire you, we have a list of daily prompts and a special giveaway raffle prize for those that complete the challenge.” Now, there are two inspiring excuses to develop whatever kind of journaling suits your style or to experiment with new approaches to keeping a diary. 

I have great ambition to take on the Inktober challenge, both the “traditional” version and the one for writers. My hope is to turn the pieces into a story, but fiction has never been my forte, so we’ll have to see how far I get with that. 

I did get through last year’s Inktober. Here are few of the less cringe-worthy pictures I drew:

 

Inktober 1 October, 2018 copyright Ruth Feiertag

(I had a lot of fun with Noodler’s Ghost ink.)

Stay tuned.