Keeping perspective, with all the crises happening in the world and down the street, on a scale of 1-10, my small worries don’t even make the scale. The test results, however dire-sounding, are as of yet still undiagnosed officially. I had to cancel my double vax (COVID/flu) because a vertigo attack was threatening, but it’s not full-blown. My cough got worse, but I’m just self-medicating. I can’t do much, with all the dizziness. Just stay home, isolated, and try to get better.
Down the street, Avdi is struggling to keep it together, with little to no help, and overwhelmed with everything. Even with recourse to solutions, he literally has no time to schedule yet another plan of action, meeting, or appointment to fix problems not of his doing. The schools are not managing to provide the disability support and accommodations they agreed to, so the kids are struggling, which puts more load on Avdi. That’s just a fraction of what he’s going through. Add on no real help from outside, exhaustion, and extra work to keep it all financed–it’s not humanly possible. Yet what choice does he have?
Out in the world, polarized factions are all justifying and rooting for their side, screaming for more revenge and genocide. The side with the biggest guns and firepower “wins”. Never mind the horrific humanitarian crisis and cost, another holocaust. When has this escalating violence ever solved or resolved anything? We’re like outraged apes throwing shit, only it’s missiles and bombs. Very rational.
It’s easy to get caught up in facing and bargaining with your own mortality, when people all around you are dealing with much more immediate, frightening, desperate situations. So for now I’m concentrating on getting better this week so I can jump back into the fray. There’s plenty of time next week to find out my dire fate.
(Arnold Lobel, F&T Are Friends)