Miscellany I want to share with y'all: In the Darkroom; Two Wolves parable; Nutmeg cat; March for Science

In no particular order of import:

Nutmeg, aka the most delightful cat in the world

Despite the apparent rotundity, we have been SO diligent with Nut's diet, and he has lost 1.5 pounds. I believe fur, loose skin, and positionality are to blame here. Plus, that damn camera adding pounds...

Two Wolves - a Cherokee parable

An old Cherokee chief was teaching his grandson about life...

"A fight is going on inside me," he said to the boy. 
"It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.

One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, self-doubt, and ego.

The other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. 

This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, 
"Which wolf will win?"

The old chief simply replied, 
"The one you feed."

In the Darkroom

Friends, you MUST read this book. Written by Susan Faludi, it is ostensibly about after her estranged, then 76-year-old father undergoing sex reassignment surgery to fully transition to a woman. And while it is an incredibly powerful discussion about self and gender identity and the recovery of a parent-child relationship that had long stood on shaky ground, it is also broader than that, taking us through considerations of national and religious identities through the lens of Hungary, historically, during World War II and the Holocaust, and more presently, since the turn of the century on. It's like a riveting history text + a mesmerizing personal tale.

I rationed my reading of it and was truly crushed when I finished it Monday. Tom and I spent some time in Budapest in 2004, just weeks after Hungary had joined the European Union. (Because I am forever talking to everyone) we found that many Hungarians felt deeply vexed about what impact(s) EU membership might have on their national identity. In light of those conversations (which led me to imagine that Hungarians had a long-standing, deeply-rooted, unified sense of what their identity was), I found Faludi's explication of Hungary's fraught history with its sense of self particularly fascinating. 

And for anyone worried about just how bad hyper-nationalistic, pro-Christian, anti-Semitic (and Muslim and Roma and...), anti-LGBTQ administrations can be for a country, just how far down a scary hole those can go, look to Hungary today where an uber-rightist, intolerant government aided and abetted by a far-right propaganda-based internet presence, has, in many ways, driven the country into the ground. Sound familiar? It's alarming to say the least.

Food

Thank god spring is (nearly) here. Grilled bread with ricotta, lemon zest, olive oil, salt and sauteed pea shoots, snow peas, and English peas is fab.

So is grilled focaccia with sauteed mushrooms (oyster, shitake, lion), creme fraiche, and thyme.

Also fab? A homemade birthday cake- chocolate and chocolate-from my mother-in-law. 41 in binary (lit/unlit candles) courtesy of my nerdtastic husband and J.

Science (and knowledge and facts) is great!

Who's marching in the March for Science on Saturday? Jack and I are marching in DC, and last I checked there were 571 satellite marches in the US and abroad. Find one and make your voices heard!

Thoughts

1. To the neighbor who left your dog's poop in my yard, and let's just say it's not that of a chihuahua, shame on you. That is straight-up rude.

2. What have I been missing by not watching C-SPAN live? I was riveted today by the couple hours (and I NEVER watch TV) of the Comey hearing I caught. The Trump admin is as dirty as they come. They have their filthy tentacles in everything. We, most ALL of us, have let this happen, and it's up to us to #resist. Have you called your reps today? I have. Please do.

3. This is a really powerful essay. Published a week ago on Ms. magazine's blog, Body Politic makes my short-list of must-reads this week. As does this essay on the meaning of The Handmaid's Tale in the time of Trump by Margaret Atwood in yesterday's (Sunday) New York Times Book Review. 
Also, I highly recommend you read In the Darkroom by Susan Faludi (brilliant discussion of identity, many forms of) as well as Evicted (tremendous study and discussion of poverty and exploitation of the poor) by Matthew Desmond.
Lastly, it seems the Oxford comma debate may finally be settled. Grammar nerds, this one's for you.

4. Tom started his new job today. It has, in many ways, been wonderful having him home for the past three weeks, but it is also nice to reorient ourselves into a more normal-for-our-age life.

5. On Friday, I am taking the boys to Louisiana for spring break. Having not left DC since before the election, I am exceedingly keen on getting out of town. I cannot wait for a break, cannot wait to sit in a white wooden rocking chair on a generous porch as a warm breeze blows across my bare legs. Cannot wait to watch the bayou glide by and the Spanish moss wave from oak boughs. Cannot wait to watch my boys run and get dirty and leave the tub ringed with scum each night. Cannot wait to sit with my parents and just be.

6. I have, lately, felt myself somewhat stifled by shoulds and perceived expectations. No more. I am who I am, folks, and I'll write and be what and who I want. Shoulds are a bully, as are living for other's needs, expectations, or hopes. Compromise is grand. Muzzling yourself and others is not. 

7. Two photos that make me happy:

In the news and why we MUST resist

I am not feeling hopeful about America right now, and frankly, I don't think you should be either. The news from the Evil Yam's dictatorly abode is getting worse and worse. Some recent developments:

Assaults on the media and freedom of the press:
CNN, The New York Times, The LA Times, and Politico, among others, were blocked from the White House press meeting. BLOCKED. This is unprecedented behavior from an American presidential administration. Indeed, just this past December (yes, the one just three months ago), Sean Spicer, WH Press Secretary said, "open access for the media is 'what makes a democracy a democracy versus a dictatorship.'" It seems the latter shoe is starting to fit quite comfortably.
-Meanwhile, a Chicago affiliate of ABC suspended an anchor for tweeting several anti-Trump sentiments. Speech seems to be becoming less free, eh?

Hate crimes and bigotry:
On Friday, two Indian-American men were shot, one of them killed, in Kansas by a white American who had been kicked out of the bar in which they all relaxed for such egregious racial slurs that other patrons complained. After leaving, he returned and fired on the men. It is being investigated as a premeditated hate crime. You think? Trump has made no statement about this event.
You probably also saw the horrific vandalization of a Jewish cemetery, Chesed Shel Emeth, in St. Louis, MO. Trump only made a statement denouncing this heinous act when asked directly about it by a journalist.
Trump is also still working on instating a travel ban despite not one reliable news or security source suggesting that such a ban is reasonable or is called for in any way. Homeland Security issued the article I link to.
Hate is becoming policy.

The roundups and threats of and actual deportations continue. Interestingly and concurrently, Trump rescinded "an Obama admin directive that would have ended the government's association with private prisons." As do many who have studied the systemically racist, enormously overpopulated, failing criminal justice system, Obama believed private prisons were "neither safe nor cost effective." But with Trump's deportation plans "comes the possibility of millions of illegal immigrants who will need to be detained somewhere" prior to their ouster. And it turns out according to USA TODAY, the private prison industry has already said thank you to Donald Trump.

After tweeting a promise to the LGBTQ community in June of 2016 to fight for them and their rights, Trump last week, with the support of newly installed Attorney General Jeff Sessions, rescinded an Obama directive aimed at protecting LGBTQ students in schools by tossing the decision to do so back to the states. As do I, many LGBTQ advocates believe desperately that federal protections are critically important to supersede the possible (likely; see North Carolina, for example) bigotry of state governments. 

Who's really running the show?:
Scary white supremacist WH Chief Strategist, Steve Bannon, emerged from the shadows of evil last week to deliver a forceful speech on plans to "deconstruct the administrative state" and "upend the world order." This included massive, sustained attacks on the media (see point 1, above). “Every day, it is going to be a fight.” Bannon remains on the National Security Council, also unprecedented. 

Trump's lies:
On February 21, Washington Post reporter, Chris Cilizza, published a well-documented piece showing that not once for the 33 days since his inauguration has Trump gone a day without lying. Some days those lies number one or two while other days the fib tally climbs to 7 or more.

Russia:
And meanwhile, Trump's (and his team's) relationships and involvement with Russia prior to the election and since remains exceptionally murky and unknown. Now, the Trump administration "has enlisted senior members of the intelligence community and Congress in efforts to counter news stories about Trump associates’ ties to Russia, a politically charged issue that has been under investigation by the FBI as well as lawmakers now defending the White House."