My fellow Americans...

When I was a young girl, I thought America was great. We had those classic history books that make it sound that way, emphasizing our best ideals and values and glossing over as much as possible of our mistakes and weaknesses. As I grew older and learned of the ways we've fallen so short of those ideals, I became disenchanted and cynical. I still loved the ideals, but a false note had been sounded.

George W. Bush embodied the worst of that to me, even before the war. But as his attitudes and policies unfolded, my disbelief and sadness grew. On a practical level, I could not but feel that his actions undermined our interests. Trying to understand other points of view is far more likely to be helpful than bombing first and asking questions later. Giving credence to terrorist claims by providing them ample evidence that we were as they imagined us to be, and failing to recognize how his actions could be perceived if one was not starting with the assumption that "America = the good guys" has been immeasurably harmful.

But there were deeper objections as well. Preemptive strikes? Torture? Erosion of civil liberties? Security at all costs? By undermining the ideals America ought to stand for, Bush has been defeating America more than any terrorist could. He has made us no better than those who would destroy us from the outside. We should rather be killed by terrorists than know that our safety has been purchased at the price of America's soul.

I therefore cannot help but admire Barack's stated desire not just to end the war but to end the mindset that led to the war. To me, practical questions about what to do now that we are embroiled in Iraq are up for debate. But American ideals are not, and changing that mindset is, in the long run, the far more important task. Along with that task comes that of regaining the world's respect. With his multicultural background, Barack is perhaps ideally suited for the great work of communicating with other nations, understanding their values and goals, and thus better equipping us to promote peace, prosperity, and freedom throughout the world (while at the same time, I believe, maintaining a humble recognition that America is neither the world's police force nor its salvation).

His stance on foreign policy is only one example of how Barack represents what is best about this country, and how he presents as stark a contrast to our current President as one can imagine. Tax cuts - the environment - these are issues on which Bush has demonstrated incredible short-sightedness, selfishness, and lack of judgment. I have confidence that as President, Obama would remain faithful to his job of serving the public, and not only today's public, but the public of the future, who will be so tremendously affected by the environmental policies of today.

Furthermore, it is clear that the job of the President has become extremely difficult due to partisan conflict. I believe that Barack has the ability to perhaps overcome this and do some real good, though even at its best, the office cannot and should not fully dictate all the laws and policies of the nation, nor can it be the only means by which positive change happens. But I also feel that, should it be the case that the American political system is so mired in bureaucracy that great progress is an impossible task for any President, we must then ask ourselves, what's left? What can a President offer us?

The best kind of leadership motivates and inspires people to do their part and to be more than they thought they could be. That takes clarity of mind and eloquence; therein, perhaps, lies the greatest gift Obama can offer us. Who can doubt the powerful effect of Churchill's words to his countrymen during the Second World War? And who among us does not get chills when we listen to Dr. King tell us of his dream that his children "will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character," and calls us to "let freedom ring!" all across America? Who can fail to be moved by so many of Lincoln's words, or by the founding fathers' bold statement, "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal..."? I cannot help but think that if America's ideals are to live on in the future, we must continue to have leaders who will give us powerful words to live by.

In one sense, as pundits have noted, Barack's campaign is about him, his character, and this great eloquence. This is fitting, as the President represents America, both at home and abroad; to a certain extent, we are what he or she is. Barack Obama does, I think, as much as anyone can, stand for and embody the best of America.

But in another sense, what he is telling us is that as President, he would not be "special". He wants us all to recapture those lost childhood ideals. He wants to encourage the cynical and pessimistic among us (including me) to believe that there may be hope after all - that we might not have to choose between our security and our ideals - that we might yet be able to change our country for the better - and that that hope lies in us, not just in our government. He is telling us that we, the people of the United States, do in fact have the power to establish justice, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. Is that what is being called an empty hope by his opponents? If this is empty, what is left to us?

Oopsie

There is a slight chance I may have lost sight of the fact that I had a blog.

Since I last posted...

My nephew was born.

I got in a car accident, in which my car was totalled, but I was not much injured and I got a new car just like my old one. I installed the front license plate bracket myself. As I was doing so, I saw the first snowflakes I'd seen this winter. One landed on the cuff of my jacket and I think it was very dry snow because it did not melt, and you could actually see the six-pointed snowflake shape. One of those moments where you can hardly breathe.

I think my landlady also got in a car accident after which her car was not worth fixing, as a little while ago I saw her car with the hood bent, and now that car is gone and there is a different car here. It is red. Her old one was green. She must have learned that red cars are the best from seeing mine.

I have become a Tim Tang Test victim.

I have eaten a lot of soup (all of which I made from scratch - soup from a can is not soup).

I have learned that a little tilt can have a big impact.

I have learned that American Gladiators is coming back! Yay!

I have learned that my cats now like catnip after all, and I have got them a Kitty Cube and some springs.

Now, here is a helpful hint for everyone. How do you know if your house/apartment is too big? You take the residents and a (red) Dirt Devil canister vac. You each take a turn with the vacuum, and in each person's turn the plug must remain in the same socket. If you can't vacuum the whole house this way, your house is too big. Parents are allowed to take the kid turns if the kids are little - the point is, the number of places the plug is plugged should not exceed the number of residents.

Call It Like It Is

Mother Teresa was not happy, we now learn.

Lot of times people split hairs over happiness and joy. I'm not so sure there is a difference of kind, only of degree. At any rate, it doesn't sound like she had either. However you want to put it, she did not feel good. Spiritual darkness, I guess she said. That doesn't sound good no matter how you slice it.

But nobody is going to disagree, I think, that Mother Teresa did a heck of a lot of good for people and led the kind of life God would approve of.

Therefore, I am going to call it like I see it, as it struck me from her words, as it has struck me in my life, as it has struck me in others' lives.

I would like to suggest that there is not, after all, a correlation between pleasing God and feeling good. I would like to suggest that one can please God and feel good, or please God and not feel good, or not please God and feel good, or not please God and not feel good (that option pretty much sucks).

Happiness, joy, whatever you want to call it - a sense of well-being, a sense that you feel being alive is a worthwhile thing, a thing which you wish to continue doing - this depends on many many factors. Genetics, circumstance, diet, exercise, habit, health, brain chemistry, who knows all the things, probably pleasing God comes into it somewhere for some of us. But there are a lot of factors that affect it.

Therefore, I would further like to suggest that pleasing God is something we do simply because we want to please God, if and when we do it. We can expect no other results. But I would also like to suggest that "the pursuit of happiness", understood properly, is also a worthwhile endeavor. I think it is not only not wrong, but in fact Good, to be happy if one can possibly manage it. Thoreau thought so too, I discover as I am reading Walden. He thought that health - not physical health but the health of the whole person - and Living could add more benefit to the lives of those around us than sympathy with suffering. I don't know that I'd go so far as to throw in the word "more" there, but other than that, I think he may have a point.

I am going to dare to say it, then. I am happy.

Ishmael

Spock's half-Vulcan, and he makes a better human than the rest of us.

Time, omniscience

Well, I saw one aspect of what omniscience is about several years ago when one of my cats was in my room with me and the door was almost completely shut, but not latched. The cat wanted to get out but there wasn't enough of a crack to get a paw in to pull it open. Now, cats just don't like closed doors, so I knew that just as one cat was wanting to get out, it wouldn't be long before another would want to get in and push the door open. Sure enough, that's just what happened. One of the aspects of omniscience is knowing the character of things or people so well that it enables you to tell what will happen.

I thought of another aspect of omniscience, or rather more of being outside of time, as I'm currently re-reading a book I've read many times. Obviously, I know what happens, but it's more than that. As I'm reading, I'm pulled into the world of the book, and while I am particularly conscious of the part I'm currently on, there's also an awareness of the parts that are coming and the book as a whole. It's almost as if all the moments in the book exist simultaneously in my mind (especially funny since the book itself takes place in two different time periods). That must be something like how it feels to exist outside of Time.

I'd only want Victorian children...

When people ask me why I don't want kids, I tell them I just don't have "it" - the drive, the thing that makes people want them. That's the most fundamental thing I can say about it, but of course it's always easy to come up with lots of supplemental reasons to support something you want anyway.

One of them which occurred to me tonight is that in today's culture, childhood and adulthood are not very compatible. There are elements of life that I enjoy, as an adult, that I feel don't "go well" with childhood. For instance, I don't like the idea of having children who want the latest fashions (the neons of the late 80's are something I could have done without, in retrospect), which they inevitably would if they mingled in society at all, but I also wouldn't want to keep children from mingling in society - it's unnatural.

People say I was a sheltered kid, but if I could change anything about my childhood, I'd make it more sheltered, more conservative. I guess I have this Victorian ideal of childhood in mind - or like in Farmer Boy - where the entertainments of adults, their thoughts and their habits, were all suitable for children. Hard work, reading aloud to the family by the fire on winter evenings, creative play... but I certainly wouldn't want to give up the things that I enjoy as an adult now just because they weren't suitable for children. Even the mere existence of TV, I think, makes a childhood such as I envision impossible, for even if you don't have one in the house, that just makes your kids more interested and curious about it, and if you have one, limitations on what they can watch have the same effect. If they're anything like me, at least. And that's ME and my life... even worse is the idea of "normal" people having children... people who work long hours, stay out late hanging out with other adults, swear, drink...

So often today, it seems, people try to preserve some of the ideal of childhood despite the fact that their own habits are inconsistent with it. They swear, but don't want their children to - though they'll probably be fine with their kids swearing when they get older. Or are they trying to bring them up to be better than themselves? In the Little House books, there was no need for that distinction. The adults behaved in the ways they asked their children to behave. They wanted them to grow up to embody the same virtues they themselves possessed. Childhood was about learning to become an adult, and the parents, in examining their own lives, could have had few qualms about wanting their children to become like them. How many people today can say the same? And even for those who can, how few outside role models there are to reinforce the ideas.

This brings a point up that I've often said: pessimists are really idealists. I'm pessimistic about the possibilities for childhood in today's society because I have high ideals of what I would like childhood to be. Optimists, I think, think things will be ok because, perhaps, they are more flexible in their definition of what is "ok". I'm pessimistic about life because I think it ought to be perfect and I know it won't be, it can't possibly be. Optimists must (I presume) accept the world more easily for what it is... either that or they're simply deluded.

It will be interesting to see how these thoughts play out over the coming years with my imminent nephew.

Can't?

Perhaps we all overuse the word can't.

"I can't go to dinner with you tonight, I have plans." Really it's not that you CAN'T, it's that your other plan is a priority to you, or your sense of following through on a commitment you've made to someone else. There are some things I really can't do. I can't become a cat, I can't go through the looking-glass to wonderland, I can't be in my house and in Paris simultaneously. But how many things do we say we can't do when what we really mean is that it's not worth it to us to make the sacrifices necessary in order to do something? It's not always a bad thing to not make those sacrifices - like keeping a prior engagement - but it is a misuse of the word can't. Figure out what's really "can't" and what's a question of priority. Then good luck figuring out your priorities...