Take the Day

The cough medicine commercial is right: a sick day is misnamed. It’s actually a “getting well” day—and I’m taking one. Admitting this may cost me a day’s pay should my boss happen upon this post (a billion to one shot, I’m sure) but it’s worth it to point out that I am not physically ill. I needed a mental health day; a day for self-care and to nurture a spirit that’s been flaring hard against a smothering global darkness and finally conceded defeat last night.

I’m down, but not out.

I may be a little drained from the daily lineup of coworkers who stop by my office to tell me their woes, but on a deeper level, I think I am royally pissed. Not with my colleagues, not with my family, not at home, and not even at life. Life is good. It’s a challenge in contrast, but life is a gift. No one has the right to rob someone else of it.

I digress.

I think that I’m pissed at the folks who sit online and berate the good intentions of others. When Paris happened, I witnessed an explosion of French flags popping up in social media as horrified humans rose to their higher natures and rallied in solidarity with France. Shortly after this surge of collective compassion, a second explosion occurred—of outraged reproach for this show of “selective support”. Beirut had been similarly assaulted on the same day. The same number of deaths and equal amount of terror were suffered there, only few in the western world had risen in that country’s support, hence those who had done so for Paris were called out as hypocrites.

They are not hypocrites. They are uninformed. Is it their fault that the western news outlets did not report the attack on Beirut? I knew nothing of it. I was still reeling from the stupidity of the Starbucks Red Cup Controversy, which got more airtime on my newsfeed than anything out of the Middle East, when I stumbled onto CNN’s coverage of Paris.

The public doesn’t decide what makes the news. Advertisers and programmers decide what we are told and, to some extent, what we’re to do about it. Then they sit back and watch the masses squabble about it all.

So I crashed. The negativity has been overwhelming, and while I believe implicitly in the power of one solitary candle, I also believe that the flame requires tending, else it will burn out completely.

Balance. Contrast. Achieving and maintaining one in the face of the other requires an awareness of your own needs as well as the needs of others. If I am guilty of anything, it’s of assuming that I have superpowers of endurance, resistance, and acceptance. Actually, I do have them, but they are not limitless. A single day should get me back on my feet. A day of green tea, quiet meditation, and gratitude.

A “get well” day.

With love,

A Declaration of Awareness

While Israel engaged Palestine and pro-Russian rebels shot a passenger jet out of the sky last week, the posts here at the Rebellion were about love, acceptance, finding peace, seeking joy and generally tripping out on the present moment. After hearing about MH17, I almost regretted scheduling those posts. In the space of a few short days, the world became an even darker and grimmer place, and I questioned whether it was appropriate to tout the power of positive energy when people elsewhere live in daily terror of losing something or someone precious. I went to bed on Friday night immensely grateful that I am not among those people. I am safe. I am employed. I have food, shelter, and enough money to live more than comfortably compared to folks trapped in a war zone halfway around the globe. Heck, I’m in better shape than people living in the BC interior, where wildfires have a handful of communities on evacuation alert if not on full evacuation order, so I don’t have to go far to ask myself how naïve am I, really?

Well, I’m not naïve. I’m not oblivious or insensitive, either. I believe what I believe, and a large part of my belief is that humans suffer when other humans make selfish decisions. Wars have raged in distant places for centuries—that doesn’t make it right, but we’re all made more aware of conflict and tragedy by a media that fixates on negative forces in pursuit of ratings. Just as we hear nothing of the countless air flights that land safely, we begin to believe that everyone is a terrorist, that no child is safe, and we’ll all be victims of identity fraud.

I sat out on my porch this morning and listened to the wind in the trees. The ocean was calm. The sun was trying to pierce the clouds and actually succeeding in spots. I watched a beam break through and remembered something. There is good in the world. Good people, brave people, loving people. People trying to cure cancer. People sheltering the homeless. People caring for sick children. People who aren’t aiming rockets at civilian communities or passenger airliners. Most of us are doing the best we can with what we have. Most of us are grateful. The rest of us are wounded and trying to heal ourselves. Yes, it’s horrible out there. Gods know the media is ever so delighted to keep telling us so, and by the same gods, we’re lapping it up like cream, but really, the scales are better balanced than we’re led to believe.

Please don’t be led. Please don’t lose hope. Please be grateful and please be compassionate—and if this seems aimed at you, it’s only my inside voice reminding Ru of what is truly valuable. That would be love, acceptance, finding peace, seeking joy, and generally tripping out on the present moment.

Be aware of the light as well as the dark, for both exist in equal measure.

With love,

Nonscents

Ter assumed garbage duty the other morning. She hauled the full bag from the can and carried it out back to deliver to the bin. Meaning to help when her back was turned, I grabbed the new garbage can liner and shook it out to install. She busted me.

“You’ll get the Febreze smell on your hands,” she said. “Wash them before you keep on with breakfast.”

Good point. The fresh-scent reek was making my eyes water. I think she must hold her breath when attending the garbage, and not because of the garbage smell. Ter is extremely sensitive to chemical and artificially-produced scents. It almost became a personnel issue at work because her one-time neighbour’s perfume threatened her with anaphylactic shock. Even I have issues with overpowering fragrance, particularly expensive parfum and cheap room deodorizers (you'd be amazed at how little difference there is between them). Glad has recently started scenting their Kitchen Catchers with Febreze – we don’t like it, but we like the liners and they don’t (as yet) have an unscented alternative.

Ter’s comment did make me wonder, though. Why do they want to make garbage smell like fresh laundry? Garbage smells to make us take it out; it’s not supposed to sit in the kitchen until it becomes compost – masking the odors could result in a bio-hazard, for crying out loud. Sure, fish for dinner can hang around until bedtime, but light a candle and play through it, people. It won’t last forever. Why make it easier to live with garbage?

Yikes, you can take that one any way you like …