Reversing

This is what we see this morning, overnight brought blowing rain as shown by water sitting on the table and my wet socks, 70F or so, 97%, slightest soft, cool breeze.

Haircut later at Tyndall, browse commissary and BX. Leaving about nine o’clock. Usually we have Philly cheesesteak there for lunch. BX card, 10% discount. And my only coke of the month.

Religious nor spiritual nor political but sometimes pugnacious, my blogs aren’t sequential, fact is I make a point of today’s not following such as answering yesterday’s question, “What does our scripture require of us?” But. If there’s a clean slate to write on, the gospel answer may be clear, but the slate’s not clean, is it, chalk smudged on the slate dates back a hundred years and more, doesn't it, and our problems, as Dalai Lama says are of our own doing, are beyond undoing; so the answer’s hazy, isn’t it. Eighty and aging, I can pick my own verses. If Jesus is the answer, we might angrily rail at the Darkness while turning the other cheek, loving our enemies, and passively waiting to be crucified by the evil that hates us. However, so far as we know, Jesus has many brothers and sisters but no children and grandchildren to agonize about, so I can’t step into his shoes nor can he walk in mine. 

Though yesterday morning I pressed “Revert to draft” for my angry rail of Monday and it sits there trying to break out of unbaptized limbo, I’m disturbed about arrogant, defiant determination in the face of the People’s fear and People's loss of confidence and trust in government’s judgment and ability. Defiant arrogance assures no one, charges on. A nation of immigrants, America is historically, still and always a compassionate, welcoming land

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

God love us, we want still, always and ever to be this, but we have seen and are afraid, reverting instinctively to self preservation, protection of those we love most, and fearing the unconscionable evil that threatens them. For what I see myself becoming, I hate myself, but I feel called by no verse or gospel to stand by silently and passively while those I love are put at risk by government that cannot and will not protect them to the max. Nor do I feel patient with government that wages war of attrition with restraint while the enemy expands derisively. Ours is not hate, it's fear. 

Enough when the anger stirs. For cover and shame, I keep myself stuffed into a box, and no doubt this blogpost also will Revert to draft in short order. I have left undone those things I ought to have done, and I have done those things I ought not to have done, and there is no health in me. Instead of loosing Pandora, I ought to have written about the cormorants, pelicans and seagulls fishing in the sea at my feet.

A large ship enters the Pass into St. Andrews Bay, moves slowly to the channel’s hairpin turn, reverses direction, and glides close by my balcony rail.