Feelings of shock and awe
It’s baffling, incongruous that it’s easier to get your hands on an AR-15 than it is to get baby formula in this country. Just sayin’.
These are things I think about when I can’t sleep which I have been doing a lot of lately.
I also think about the once again uptick in COVID cases being reported around the country. I’ll be donning a mask again even though I am twice boosted. Weird sideways glances and snide underthe-breath comments be damned.
I think about monkeypox and never in my wildest dreams (when I was sleeping and had dreams) did I ever think I would think about this virus that’s in the same family as smallpox only with milder symptoms. I mean up until recently when cases were discovered in Europe and America, the virus was only found in certain African countries. But, apparently, it’s here now and no amount of mask wearing will protect anyone as it’s spread through close contact with infected people, their bodily fluids, clothing or bedsheets. It mostly effects young men but still, isolating again is starting to sound like a good idea for a whole bunch of reasons like …
Amynthas agrestis more commonly known as “jumping worms.” These little suckers have voracious appetites and are able to eat through thick layers of leaf debris and ground-bird nests leaving behind nutrient-free dry castings threatening forest habitat as well as residential and commercial environments like landscapes, gardens and nurseries. OK so while that’s bad enough to contemplate what’s really creepy is that these worms thrash wildly when handled, can jump a foot in the air and clone themselves. Like spiders aren’t bad enough, we now have all consuming, self-cloning, jumping wigglers.
And they say gardening is good therapy. Yeah, I’m not so sure about that anymore. I mean I’m all for nature except when it can jump uninvited on me.
And then there are humans who leave me in shock and awe on a regular basis. Seems to me it takes more energy to be rude than it does to be nice. I mean have you ever noticed how rude or generally angry people always seem a bit red in the face; that their faces are all squinched up; and their general energy seems to vibrate at an uncomfortable frequency? It’s a mystery to me why anyone would choose this condition but some people do.
Like the man in the big black pickup I encountered earlier this week. I was making a left hand turn on a green arrow. He was first in line in cross traffic at a red light. I was more than half way through the intersection when the green arrow turned yellow. I obviously proceeded to make my turn. What was I supposed to do? Stop mid intersection? Throw the car in reverse and back up?
Anyway, as I turned past him, he screamed out his window at me “stupid bleep bleep.” While he was in no way a danger to me, I was jarred and rattled by his venom. I was in shock. I was in awe. It was like getting blasted by a hot, dry northerly wind. Not at all pleasant.
Perhaps that’s why several blocks later when a woman in a mini van pulled up next to me and motioned me to wind down my window, I halfsmiled but ignored the request. Two blocks later I was stopped side by side with her at a red light and she was now rather frantically motioning me to wind down the window. I took a deep breath and complied, just wanting to get whatever bit of crazy this was going to be over and done with.
“You’re really beautiful,” she said when my window was down. “Just very gracious and elegant looking.”
I was so stunned I didn’t know what to say. I was in shock (again). I was in awe (again). I did manage a full smile a quick “thank you” before the light turned green and off she went with a smile and a wave.
And as I accelerated and went on may too, the AR-15 supply versus the shortage of baby formula still nagged at me but, the man in the big black pickup seemed insignificant and so did COVID, monkeypox and jumping worms. It was a beautiful thing and I remain grateful for this bit of kindness from a stranger.