It’s time again for MK’s Corner! This month I’m talking about what’s coming up in February–namely, a secret little project with @sineadpersaud & @hartgracesarah–answering your questions, and recommending my favorite movie from last year. Enjoy!
A Saffron Finch from today’s adventures outside of #Bucaramanga #Colombia. There’s no drama when you go birding by yourself and leave your phone at home :) #birding with #tamarin and #canon
On Holocaust Remembrance Day, this twitter account is posting the names and photos (when available) of refugees turned away from America who became victims of Naziism. #NoBanNoWall #RefugeesWelcome
always challenge them. never believe that your opinions are set. on anything, and I mean politics and religion and life, but I also mean small things like what you like to eat or read or watch.
know what you want and know what you enjoy, but never believe that those things are set in stone. earlier this year, I didn’t like fish, or tofu, or Star Wars, or Russian literature. two years ago I hated Herman Melville. at every point I thought that these were just parts of my personality, things that had no reason to change.
but I was always always open to changing my mind. to eating fish anyway. to giving the franchise another chance. to trying to read the book again.
can you imagine anything more terrifying than remaining static as a person? than forming your opinions at twenty-five and never changing them?
so when I found myself in another country and my friend said, here is a plate of fried tofu and here is fish curry, and here is this, and here is this, do you want it, I know you don’t like–I said no. I said forget what I like, forget what I don’t like. I’ll try it.
when I saw that the movie cast was diverse I said, okay, I will try this one more time. when I had the opportunity to go see a play based on Tolstoy, I jumped at the chance. you’re never going to grow by sitting still or traveling in the same grooves over and over.
I’ve spoken about how I get bored easy and end up doing odd things to get myself out of it, but sometimes I also get bored with myself, I don’t see the point in never changing. I never want to say no to the thing that will open up my world. I don’t enjoy hating things, I always want more things to love, to fall in love with, to change me.
I don’t always love everything I try, but I’m never sorry that I tried.
so try everything once. as Stephen Colbert says, say yes. listen to people who think differently from you, try things you think you’ll hate. take opportunities. push yourself. never trust your own perceptions, always be ready to change your mind.
This is a Red-Breasted Nuthatch! Heard a flock of them outside and rushed for my camera to see who it was. First time seeing them and they’re very neat! So tiny too.
america as we knew it is falling to shit as we watch this president-elect create a reality in which many of us do not exist.
how do I explain my grief to people like my parents who don’t share my reality?
they share the presidents’ reality, in which the things I mourn are not worthy of human jurisdiction, thus unworthy of grief when they are gone.
There’s a division happening. Being low-key and quietly going about our lives is becoming harder to do. Some people are able to wrap themselves in an illusion that things are better now, and will soon be better still. Others are grief-stricken and horrified.
The illusion is a lot more attractive some ways, and it probably shouldn’t be surprising that many are opting for it. But I’m not willing to do that, and I’m pretty sure that anyone who is perceptive and honest enough to be someone I follow is going to have real problems with it too.
So we’re left with this alternative, which sucks, and a lot of us are struggling with it. We don’t know how bad things will get, but we have a huge sense of foreboding that’s hard to live with.
There are a few things I’ve seen floating through my social media streams in the last couple of days that offer advice on self care and not burning out on too much outrage about too many things in too short a time; picking some smaller, more-specific aspects of the larger problem to focus on; and giving oneself the leeway to tune out the ugly and dip back into it according to one’s own schedule and capacity. I think that advice is worth following.
@sylvia-morris talked about having separate hardware/locations (computer in workspace vs. mobile device in the other room, I think she said) to allow her to get things done. I made a decision shortly after Election Day to consciously limit how much outrage I was going to amplify on Tumblr specifically, keeping Twitter as a place where I focus on those concerns, which allows me to exercise some control by choosing which platform to go on. And so on; I’m sure everyone is different.
I feel for you. The amount of support you’re going to get from people living in a bubble of alternate facts in which everything’s going great is likely to be quite small. I don’t know how you change that. That gulf is real, and widening. Maybe there will be bridges across it some day.
