Scientists spotted a freaky face on Jupiter last week, and I’ve been looking at it and thinking about it, partly due to the need for, or as reminder that I, that we all are insignificant in this vast and weird universe. And the other part because it’s so damn beautiful and wondrous and the last two weeks have been anything but, have been awful not awe-full, the earth spinning the people spinning into madness and violence and destruction under the baleful stare of the planets.
With a thousand fears that vision's face was grained; Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground, And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan. “Strange friend,” I said, “here is no cause to mourn.” “None,” said that other, “save the undone years, The hopelessness. Whatever hope is yours, Was my life also; I went hunting wild After the wildest beauty in the world, Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair, But mocks the steady running of the hour, And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here. For by my glee might many men have laughed, And of my weeping something had been left, Which must die now. I mean the truth untold, The pity of war, the pity war distilled. from "Strange Meeting" by Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)
It’s weird, too, that we are so very free to speak our minds to talk incessantly into the void that is not space but human void, but that we are not really free, not free at all to say anything, anything at all. I say I am capable of holding these truths: terrorism against innocents is horrible and state-sanctioned violence is equally so. I don’t want to hear any what abouts because if provoked I will walk toward your bullet before sending one of my own which means I’d be dead and you would have killed me. Anguish. What is the end game?
It’s weird, too, speaking of guns, maybe even super weird, that one of the most powerful members of #terribleAmerica’s ruling body is a nut who believes himself to be a channel for god (or God for him) who believes with fervency that women’s bodies should be regulated and divorce should be harder (because it’s so easy now?) but that guns of war (lots of weird war today) should be free to buy to use to protect oneself against (who?) for liberty and individual rights (to thee I sing) and that it took many days many days for fully armed people even to find the guy (always the guy the man angry mentally ill whatever) dead by his own hand after blowing away a bunch of bowlers and revelers, the youngest 14 and oldest 72.
It’s weird, too, that when I spoke to Nice Neurologist last week, he asked me about some piece of literature or another and what I thought about it and what he was reading and thinking about and we talked, like that, for nearly twenty minutes. I only say it’s weird because — well — neurology and the many years of talking talking talking to neurologists and here’s one that talks more about the awe-full than the awful and that’s a blessing, albeit weird.
It’s weird, too, that Sophie doesn’t have big seizures any more and the ones that she does have are tiny little jerks that happen in clusters that you can barely see, and they happen rarely enough but she does have a trach and a g-tube and I laugh with rue about that, the irony, the relentless weirdness of it all. Sophie, Sophie, Sophie, Sophie.
Ah, are you digging on my grave, My loved one? — planting rue?
It’s weird, too, to keep going, to remind oneself (myself, as I can’t speak for your self) that there are Sophies all over the world, in Gaza (I saw a video of a child seizing, bloody on a stretcher in a bombed-out hospital?) and elsewhere, that our Sophie is safe in her purple room in her wheelchair her hair braided her belly full her ability to breathe and clear her secretions intact, her meds lined up (like poison, true), her bed a nest warm secure for however long who knows.
It’s weird, too, to get texts from the drugstore and texts from the trach suppliers, the adult diaper suppliers, to be on top of it all.
It’s weird, too, that woo hoo.
It’s weird, too, that I can ask Chat GPT this and get that.
Tell me four things that are weird about the world.
Certainly! Here are four things that some people might find weird or unusual about the world:
Quantum Mechanics: Quantum mechanics is a branch of physics that describes the behavior of very small particles, like electrons and photons. It's weird because it defies our everyday intuition. In the quantum world, particles can exist in multiple states simultaneously, and their properties can change instantaneously when observed. Concepts like entanglement, where two particles can be connected in such a way that the state of one affects the other, seem strange and almost mystical.
The Mandela Effect: The Mandela Effect is a phenomenon where a large group of people remember an event, fact, or detail one way, even though it never happened that way. The term gets its name from the widespread belief that Nelson Mandela died in the 1980s, when, in reality, he passed away in 2013. This collective misremembering of events or facts can be quite perplexing and raises questions about the reliability of human memory.
Time Dilation: According to Einstein's theory of relativity, time is not a constant, and it can be affected by gravity and velocity. This means that time can pass at different rates for different observers. For example, time appears to slow down for objects in motion relative to a stationary observer and also near massive objects like black holes. It's a weird concept because it challenges our intuitive understanding of time as a fixed and unchanging dimension.
In 2017, a Palestinian woman named Mosab Abu Toha set up a makeshift library on the beach in Gaza City, known as the "Beach Library." It contains books salvaged from the ruins of Gaza, offering a space for people to read and learn, despite the challenging circumstances.
These examples highlight some of the strange and fascinating aspects of our world that can leave people puzzled and intrigued.
Weird, right?
I keep hearing these words in my tiny little mother mind™:
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars,
Then peace will guide the planets,
And love will steer the stars.
When you rolled into my inbox I dropped everything to read you. You illuminate me as always love,
Rebecca
Dearest Elizabeth. The moon is rising full and round and salmon colored over my wee forest. Another troll, this one made of wood, presides over the waters of Puget Sound in Lincoln Park. They are very large and beautiful, covered with wooden shingles, of course.
I took my baby cats to be vaccinated but ran away after seeing the line, full of barking dogs in the cold morning, a two hour wait, I panicked. My boys who are 13 weeks old who kiss me on the mouth and lie around me purring in the morning. I tell them I love them all the time. They ruin plants and knock things over and barf under the bed but I love them terribly.
All of this to say that Sophie has small seizures and the weird text messages will continue to come and I may have delivered my very last baby last week. Wasn't it Ken Kesey who said, "We're all bozos on this bus?" Love you always.
B