just meandering through
i rarely walk by a bird without stopping to talk… or stalk. i was not previously aware, though, that if you startle this fine gentleman here (a mockingbird, i do believe), he will FLOOF UP. like so.
i laughed, which i suppose is not the comforting, accepting response i want when friends put me on ridiculous-looking defensive behavior…
how about i keep a post in drafts to see what all caught my eye or ear this week?
hot divorcée summer – as someone with an ex-to-be, i declare this essay superior to the vanity fair piece on the topic that it links.
https://what3words.com/ – i’m way too enthusiastic about this. like wanting to announce location words enthusiastic, and seems dangerous to do on social media and such. but telling people a three-word code for the back patio’s precise location seems neat.
CovidActNow is still one of my go-to sites for COVID stats. today it strikes me that the vaccination rate in my typically 80+% democrat-voting metro area is almost on par with the rate in my parents’ super-conservative rural county. it’s NOT just a politicized thing; i suspect general trust in government is playing a major role. but thank goodness the rates are down enough EVERYWHERE in the US that i’m no longer compulsively checking on a daily basis.
yesterday was the virginia primary election. i honestly wasn’t very well-prepared; after friends messaged to peer pressure, i read up a bit and stopped to vote before my book club’s meeting.
however, talking with a close friend of opposed political persuasion about the election was one of my better conversations of the day. we always dance and tell stories back and forth and find patches of overlap that reflect our common values. as much as i’m working on learning to confront and argue (I WANT TO BE BRAVER IN DEFENDING MY TRUTHS), i love this form of engagement, it’s a piece of why she’s one of my favorites. i asked if she was voting, she let me know that there wasn’t a republican primary, and she wasn’t going to start voting in the democratic ones unless virginia turns so blue that it’s her only genuine venue of political participation. i mused a little bit on MY candidates.
our point of agreement for the day was this: we both want very different things from our legislators than we do from our executives. a legislator, a tiny piece of a big governing body, CAN be a big voice for the more extreme points of view, bring attention to things that the rest of the group might not otherwise see. we’ll vote for them there. executive branch, one-issue folks aren’t going to cut it for either of us. we both *want* more wisdom, more experience, more ability to build coalitions and work across lines to get things done. that hasn’t necessarily been a popular viewpoint across years and years of people running for government by campaigning -against- government — the businesspeople who count it as a point of pride that they don’t have insider experience. yet the amount of information that government has to process now is so giant! are our institutions up to modern complexity even when we’re hiring by matching resume to job? one of my favorite soapboxes is ranting about virginia having a part-time legislature covered by a fragile press system that’s frequently too hollowed out to have a state bureau… i love my local paper, but even with good richmond coverage and a relatively lively interest and knowledge of what governmental powers lie at which levels, *i* often lose track of the horse race. i have to work and live in addition to reading news!
which leads to… campaigning by channeling frustration with government has been popular for a long time now. how COULD we start moving the narrative back toward treating elections like a serious hiring process? how do we make it worth staying informed enough to make choices that lead to a government that We The People *do* like?
mid-divorce, i realized that the domain name that i registered for playing around is connected to him. as much as i’m not sure i ever needed one in the first place, this is a very inexpensive bit of closure to arrange.
narrative. peripatetic. therapy. errata. air.
who knows what drives the need to publicly disclose, but here it is again. as i tried to think of an encapsulating theme for things i wanted to ramble about, i was getting a lot of æɹ sounds. punch errative into google… no such word, but erration is an obsolete term for wandering or roving. perfect.
i very much miss the days of blogs and livejournals. i don’t think i’ll go out of my way to disguise myself here, but i’d like to keep it anonymous enough to require a little work if you’re matching it up to the meat-space me. maybe i’ll even make a list of code-names… that’d be fun, right? i’m mid-divorce, recently diagnosed with ADHD. i made it through all but the dissertation of a phD in public policy, now work for local government. current frequent interests include a camera (i’m not sure i’d call it “photography” just yet, that implies more knowledge and discipline), books, medications and meditations, dancing, films where nothing much happens, reckoning with the COVID-suppressed desire to travel again, my old house and what to do with it, music… “steady interest” isn’t really me, either, though; i dabble.
anyway. hello, world.