Things are pretty fucked up and the future is uncertain — probably the worst in my lifetime (perhaps excepting 1969 before I can remember). When it’s like that, I like to think about my grandparents and what they faced and got through with the Great Depression and WWII.
/1
/2 There were absolutely no guarantees that everything would be all right. Terrible things were happening and more terrible things were a distinct possibility. But they got through it, relying on the fundamental things they cared about.
/3 I think about Grandma taking a taxi to the hospital to have my mom, forbidding my grandpa’s parents from calling him to let him know — he was on base studying for the supply officer test the next day, and doing well would determine where he was assigned, and maybe whether he’d live or die.
/4 (Grandpa’s parents had a car, but grandma had a flair for drama, I think.)
He did well and went off to be the supply officer on a ship in the Pacific. Went with absolutely no guarantee of coming back. That’s what people did.
/5 So, in terrible circumstances, think what people before you have endured. Think about how you can support and defend folks less able than you to endure. And fight the bastards.
one thing I've learned during some rather personal difficulties over the last several years is that you focus on what you can manage/handle/fix, and you don't worry about what *might* happen until it actually happens. Doesn't mean you don't prepare, but you only have so much steam.
