Taking it easy, People
I know I have been a bit dire lately. Dire times.
It’s hard for me to compartmentalize almost anything. Once it’s in my mind I can sometimes sort it out. My perception is the funnel. I am the chute. So, it’s the sorting you’re hearing.
I’ve been hung up on the reality of what is happening politically and culturally. The fear it causes in me and the seeming powerlessness at the core of that fear. I innately want to believe that there is a surprise shift possible. A magic bullet, a drastic paradigm shift that can happen instantly because of an event. That is hope. Though it is a kind of magical thinking. Until it isn’t.
I think about the power of ‘art’ constantly as being that potential explosive catalyst. Like there is one image, moving or still, one line of poetry, one drastic act that will save us. It’s ridiculous because it has to be cumulative, collaborative, coincidental and serendipitous. It also has to have enough traction to stick for more than a few days and not get lost in the churn filling the funnel.
So, we chip away against something that has been calculated and executed on all fronts for decades. The great mind fucking initiated in the collective unconscious by calculating totalitarian thinkers and the money behind them. So be it.
I can do what I do. It lands here and there. Shifts thinking a little bit one way or the other in people. Fine. I have to try to let go of being consumed by it all meaning something all the time. My time, my talking, anything that comes up in my mind has to imply something real or mostly fictional, speculative.
So, I’m taking it easy for a few days. I took a week off from comedy. I’m just trying to sit with my life, cats, partner, food. Be outside. Lie on the grass. Sit in a chair. Let the sun beat down on my face. I’d like to make this stuff an essential part of my life as opposed to a brief, usually unsuccessful, reprieve from the internal and external churn. Looking for answers. Bits of relief through phrasing.
It’s the act of poetry through comedy that keeps me sane.
On the cat front, Charlie is back from the fog of the Fluoxetine experiment. After two weeks of sadness on my part, and I think discomfort on Charlie’s, I took him off the meds. I think I may have already told you this but to reiterate, he’s back to himself. It took a minute but he’s pretty much all here now and I couldn’t be happier about it.
All that talk about him adjusting or you have to give it time almost makes me mad at myself. He’s not even three yet. He’s still out of his mind. When I’m home I can get between him and Buster. My experience with cats leads me to believe that eventually things will settle down. Buster used to bite the shit out of old Monkey when Monkey was frail. It passed. Kind of. Monkey got sicker but it wasn’t Buster's fault.
So, maybe this is a little cat Karma for Buster. Either way, the real issue is how deeply attached little Charlie is to me and what to do about that when I’m away. I’m working on a less permanent med intervention. Hopefully it will be effective.
I also ordered a cat tree. That’s the day you surrender your house to cats. Whatever pride you put into decorating or maintaining a look of a house goes right into the toilet when you get a cat tree. I’m just hoping it gives him more to do when he’s bored than to beat up the other guys. We’ll see.
This week I talk to two truly hilarious women. Liza Treyger on Monday and Jessica Kirson on Thursday. Very funny.
Enjoy!
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
Love,
Maron
