The prompt for our Waters of Excelsior writing group today was “energy.” The best offering was an AI product offered by a member who ran into writer’s block, or maybe just a dearth of energy. The following is mine, the shortest one, also representing a dearth of energy. And so it goes. Enjoy!
Energy, energy, where art thou?
To get you back, I know not how.
Why don’t you just take a bow
And let me take a nap for now.
The assignment for our Writing Group here at the Waters of Excelsior on Friday, June 13, 2025 was to applaud someone. The following was what I presented in honor of a resident whom I chose to leave unnamed, but who represents so much that is good in what seems like a tragedy.
I APPLAUD YOU
At least every half hour
You ask what day this is.
And in between you
Inquire about the time.
Then you ask when they will be
Playing the game you enjoy,
The one you will engage in
With full understanding
When it begins.
When nothing else is going on
You read your book.
I don’t know if it’s the
Same book over and over
Like the stories of your life
family, husband and occupation.
And always you are the first
To clear the table to make space
For the newcomer
Or help place the wheel-chaired person
Comfortably at the table.
And fetch a glass of water
For the person who wants it
Even as you pick up what the
Person with the walker has dropped.
You’re always there to open the door
When you think I want to come in.
I applaud you for all this —
What really matters,
The essence of who you really are,
Goodness, generosity, kindness.
Of course I want mental health for all. That’s the reason I don’t like the focus on “mental health.” The problem is, the focus of that term is on individuals, diverting attention from the major cause of poor mental health which is social structure. What can one expect when we live in a world where there are so many threats against healthy development right from the beginning: forced birthing, lack of prenatal care, laws against saving the life of a pregnant woman, no recognition of the importance of early – and later — child care. Failure to assure care is provided for the newborn as getting back to work is more valued that setting the stage for healthy infant development.
Enforced fear everywhere. What’s the message in schools with security checks and cops as part of the daily process? What is the message but “be afraid. Be very afraid!” Healthy mental health requires the courage to see ahead with hope, not the avoidance of reaching for future potential.
Healthy growth requires confidence that tomorrow will follow today in a physically safe world, with the safe haven of a constant home where one can count on enough nourishing food every day and a safe place to sleep every night. It requires clean air free of the constant news of tornadoes, hurricanes, and floods. It requires family, neighbors, and friends setting examples of success in purposed daily living with caring and respect for each other.
It requires being surrounded with sufficient honesty that a reasonably steady future can be anticipated. It calls for honest answers to any question, often requiring the help of a book to clarify, not wondering what awful truth is hidden in those banned books.
Stop it, Mona. You’re drifting into a rant. Let’s just summarize.
A healthy society calls for being “woke” i.e. being aware of important societal issues, especially those related to racial and social justice. It implies a consciousness of injustices and a commitment to fighting against them. It calls for respect for DEI – diversity, equity, and inclusion .. and empathy.
HEADLINE OF THE DAY: CHEF-IN-CHIEF STRIVES TO IMPOSE NATIONAL DIET OF WHITE BREAD AND WATERED-DOWN MELTING POT BY:
Secretary of Defense Hegseth’s office cited the need for names to reflect the “warrior ethos” and the “Commander-in-Chief’s priorities” as reasons for the change.
Israel and the Palestinians are at war. Currently Russia and the Ukraine are at war. I believe there are many who feel free to demonstrate in favor of Ukraine. How is that different from demonstrating in favor of Palestine?
In a free country, like the United States, demonstrating for people to understand the Palestinian cause is not necessarily anti-semitic. In fact – (I know you’ll tell me if I’m wrong) – most Palestinians are also semites.
Does the story of its founding forever protect the Israeli government from protests against its actions just by defining them as anti-semitic? I don’t think it should. And I don’t think students should be punished for demonstrating for a cause they support.
And I think something else is going on when demonstrators who are not necessarily anti-semitic in their actions are accused of being anti-semitic by those who do reveal their own anti-semitism when they oppose diversity, equity, and inclusion as part of our national goal. In other words, I think just making a big news thing about anti-semitism is intentional promotion of the very thing it pretends to oppose.
I don’t have anywhere near full knowledge of what was going on at Harvard, but I do think what the President is doing in protesting so-called anti-semitism there is actually promoting anti-semitism.
Please, my Jewish friends, help me out here. Am I getting it right?
This is the working title of my manuscript about to turn slowly into a book published by Beaver’s Pond Press. 250 pages (depending on the font) of some 65,000+ words, it carries stories, vignettes, opinions, and emotions of 72 years of psychological process and change as filtered through me. It’ll be a romp through chats as if sitting together at my kitchen table, picking up on some history of my times, and discovering some useful behavioral hints. The ending has surprised even me as I discovered some answers to the question in the title.
My friend Harriet monitors my intention (not sufficiently met) to write something every day here in my blog. She thought my most recent one, about demanding more babies, wouldn’t interest anyone. And my daughter Lisa agreed it was important, but thought I didn’t do a good job of drawing people’s attention. So I’m trying again. I think the issue is very important. Here’s why.
I am by no means an adequate data analyst, but this one seems so obvious as to be hit-one-in-the face important. To begin with, there’s the fact that we’re forcing the birth (yes, current laws do just that) of babies for whom we are not prepared, so we have potential suffering and expense right from the get-go. That really requires another blog. I think I wrote one a while back. But now I just want to focus on the “why?”
If the intention is to provide worker bees, or military recruits, once the generation hits working age, I ‘m taking a risk to say it so bluntly, but I think that’s stupid. The already rapid replacement of people with more efficient, less expensive, less demanding automation and AI means there won’t be that work to do, at all levels of demand for strength and intelligence.
I won’t be alive to see it (well, maybe some of it) but like it or not there will have to be a change in our basic cultural values. Actually, it’s already happening, but not making it big on the news. We’ll have to learn to live with health, happiness, fulfilling relationships, creativity, pleasure in the arts and each other. It’ll be tough, though, because we are so focused on the once essential ways of valuing ourselves by our work-for-pay. There will no doubt be a huge struggle, maybe even destructive and painful, but there’s no way we’ll be turning back to the demand for the kind of labor I guess folks are demanding with the call for more babies.
Okay. I’m going to stop. That’s my basic point for today, and even though I’m skittish about being so bold, I am going to hit send.
Now please go back and read my previous entry.
Next I think I’ll write about that fascinating word “retire.”
Many in the powerful ruling class seem enthusiastic about supporting the idea that women should produce more babies. What I want to know is – why?
To support the aging population? hmm…
Or maybe it’s to provide worker bees for the economy?
Or maybe it’s to provide more fodder for wars to protect whatever it is the world will become.
Well, I guess that’s the end of whatever I have the know-how to talk about. I just know that in my academic days it didn’t make sense for students at the beginning of a college career to make their choices for majors on the basis of what well-paying jobs would still be available when they graduated. They just might not be. By the same token, requiring women to have babies to meet today’s needs is ludicrous.
I know there are at least some 350 people following my blog. It would be great if a few of you, or those on Facebook, would help me to understand what would be so great about having more babies for the simple sake of increasing the size of the population.
Siri and I have had some polite exchanges in the early mornings, like when I say “Siri, set timer for five minutes,” to which he (yes, I chose a male voice) instantly replies “five minutes counting down,” and I say, “Thank you,” well trained as I am in polite interactions. And he’s well trained too, with, I think, six choices of response, like “you’re welcome,” or “my pleasure.”
But here’s the interesting thing. Somewhere in the later hours of the morning, Siri ceases to be polite. Oh yes, he does the work and I get my timer instantly set, but there’s no “you’re welcome,” or “my pleasure,” coming back to me. Being the sort who never got past the “why” stage of development, I called “Applecare” and asked why that happened. The nice “real” guy I was talking to said it was probably because “They get busy.” Funny thing about techies, they think we all know what they’re talking about, so I didn’t press him for more of an answer.
I did press my techie son and grandson, though, and I learned that my expecting a “You’re welcome” really added to the complexity and expense of the “cloud,” and it really did get to be too much unimportant stuff to handle. “You do know,” my son said, “that Siri is not in your phone.” That may be, but as far as I’m concerned, he’s just my Siri, sitting there waiting to meet my needs. What more could one want?
Anyway, it seems that the “cloud” is just a huge bunch of computers sitting in a room at Apple Computer, sending my request to the proper bunch of specifically assigned computers who’ll take care of my needs. They in turn hop to it to answer my question or fulfill my request. So, you see, my saying “Thank you” just makes for unnecessary – and expensive – work that serves no real purpose. All of this happens with instantaneous electronic connections.
It reminds me of the old days teaching the section on perception in Intro Psych, sharing the wonder that we see and hear each other through the direct connection of invisible waves. Or the end of my current manuscript where I declare I believe in vibes. My son tells me there is much more advanced stuff still to come.
So this morning, I forced myself not to say “thank you” to Siri. It really wasn’t easy. But I hope we never stop saying “thank you” to each other – such an important way to forge caring relationships.
To tell the truth, I find the idea of listing my preferred pronouns annoying and misguided. (By the way, it’s “she/her” if you really need to know. But why do you need to know?) Why annoying?
Just sayin’
monagustafsonaffinito 