Seriously.
I can’t write of my outrage and despair here and I’m talking about the decision to bomb Syria coupled with the mass shooting in California, in case there was any question.
For some reason lately, I’ve been watching You Tube documentaries on various religious practices. These include cloistered Catholic monks and nuns, Muslim women in prayer and devotion, Buddhist nuns, Buddhist monks, Hassidic marriage rituals, Jewish scholars — I think that covers it so far.
Why? I do not know.
Oh wait. I know. It relaxes me. Yes it does.
And lately I’ve had a fantasy of quitting everything and joining those cloistered nuns for 8 hours of prayer a day and then some gardening and bread-making.
And then sleep. And that’s it. Pray for the world — work — and sleep.
Of course it’s all a ridiculous fantasy because I wouldn’t last two days toiling and praying in silence and I need to watch television, check Facebook, listen to WTF with Marc Maron, and watch trashy television.
And also — there’s AP.
But maybe five minutes of meditation in the morning wouldn’t hurt. And a prayer for kindness.
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I get to the point where I just turn off the radio (because there will likely be a news=flash interruption) and do something that will not drag me into despondency or argument.
I revisited an exhibition at the local gallery and wrote, briefly and without saying much, on the blog.But I look around at this relatively safe, wealthy, caring country…and I despair. We’re being torn apart and sold off for a few shekels.
And we still cram the displaced into filthy camps on someone else’s land.
Oh I know, I know. But I’m glad you are pulling the plug on the radio and turning to something that feeds the soul.
The news is on here for hours every day. It does wear on you, so I turn on Turner Classic Movies to cleanse my mental palate when I’ve had enough.
It is incomprehensible, absolutely incomprehensible. I think you are quite right when you speak of looking for things that feed the soul. Standing in the book store yesterday I heard the Beatles’ “Let It Be”: ‘When all the broken hearted people living in the world agree, there will be an answer- Let it be…’ Will we?