I'm 75, with 73 yo wife, "challenged" stepdaughter, two challeged but lovable dogs, and I feel your pain. Deeply. As this just a comment, I only add that Caitlin again hits the nail on the head and gives a beautiful moral compass: Witness the beauty, it is all around. As I will continue to remind myself...
I do not live too far away from Vandenberg AFB. last year or so, major air flights over head, low and LOUD. I get so PTSD, sometimes I scream at the sky, as the noise is oppressive and can continue at times, 10 minutes perhaps? I feel this is all about preparing for war with China. I once in early 80s protested that airbase several times, met Daniel Ellsberg, guided him into the back country. So Cait tells me I do nothing, and my depression is not well deserved? Also met breifly Daniel Ortega via Amy Goodman, in San Fran, before we went out to try to stop arms shipments to Nicaragua at Concord Naval Weapons Station. But, i am a bad person for getting depressed. Being depressed means what again?
Sorry, too much contradictions in her piece and useless condemnations, self aggrandisement. I live in one of the most beautiful places on earth, in small town on the coast. Watching humans trash it is not particularly pleasant, much like Hedges piece on Isolation and his experience at his local gym, which is on Substack, BTW.
It is painful. I've been an active environmentalist since before I knew the word, growing up 30 miles out of NYC. I was a bio major and in Nature much of my life. It is because of this and so much more that I appreciate Caitlin's reminder on where to keep my attention, as I do work at daily.
But are you really a useless good-for-nothing POS in need of condemnation because you feel depressed, full of grief, and despair? I do not connect these things in this way. We all have different levels of sensitivity and debilitation, isolation, perimeters of influence. I see my great grief because those things of beauty have been swiftly disappearing and destroyed, not because i am an "inferior" person, which is what is inferred here IMO. It is overwhelming as if one looks at history, then adds 8 billion, any fantasies or projections about human enlightenment is looking through some rose colored lenses and automatically condemns anyone who sees the horror and atrocity. Feels like gaslighting to suggest anyone who feels despair or depression is somehow inferior and not doing enough. Sigh. If she had perhaps omitted that one line or two, this piece would have had a different shade.
I'm 75, with 73 yo wife, "challenged" stepdaughter, two challeged but lovable dogs, and I feel your pain. Deeply. As this just a comment, I only add that Caitlin again hits the nail on the head and gives a beautiful moral compass: Witness the beauty, it is all around. As I will continue to remind myself...
You are lucky.
I do have a beautiful bratty cat, a small orchard, and vegetable garden. So thankful I am not getting drone attacks!!!
Yeah - when I feel really gloomy, I remember that I live in an attractive part of rural Scotland, and not in Yemen.
I do not live too far away from Vandenberg AFB. last year or so, major air flights over head, low and LOUD. I get so PTSD, sometimes I scream at the sky, as the noise is oppressive and can continue at times, 10 minutes perhaps? I feel this is all about preparing for war with China. I once in early 80s protested that airbase several times, met Daniel Ellsberg, guided him into the back country. So Cait tells me I do nothing, and my depression is not well deserved? Also met breifly Daniel Ortega via Amy Goodman, in San Fran, before we went out to try to stop arms shipments to Nicaragua at Concord Naval Weapons Station. But, i am a bad person for getting depressed. Being depressed means what again?
But is not that so very .... sad. Sigh. When you know our war machines and corruption is causing these sorts of suffering, and our taxes pay for it!
Sorry, too much contradictions in her piece and useless condemnations, self aggrandisement. I live in one of the most beautiful places on earth, in small town on the coast. Watching humans trash it is not particularly pleasant, much like Hedges piece on Isolation and his experience at his local gym, which is on Substack, BTW.
It is painful. I've been an active environmentalist since before I knew the word, growing up 30 miles out of NYC. I was a bio major and in Nature much of my life. It is because of this and so much more that I appreciate Caitlin's reminder on where to keep my attention, as I do work at daily.
But are you really a useless good-for-nothing POS in need of condemnation because you feel depressed, full of grief, and despair? I do not connect these things in this way. We all have different levels of sensitivity and debilitation, isolation, perimeters of influence. I see my great grief because those things of beauty have been swiftly disappearing and destroyed, not because i am an "inferior" person, which is what is inferred here IMO. It is overwhelming as if one looks at history, then adds 8 billion, any fantasies or projections about human enlightenment is looking through some rose colored lenses and automatically condemns anyone who sees the horror and atrocity. Feels like gaslighting to suggest anyone who feels despair or depression is somehow inferior and not doing enough. Sigh. If she had perhaps omitted that one line or two, this piece would have had a different shade.