Good Blood, Bad Blood

“How many times can a man turn his head, and pretend he just doesn’t see?”

Bob Dylan

Wind and more wind scours the Hood River Valley. It’s an elemental force for which we are known. The Columbia Gorge is the largest air transfer route through the Cascade Mountains. When the prevailing winds return in the Spring, speed junkies flock to the river. The multi-colored gear of sailors adds a festive atmosphere to the shore. They don dry suits, which protect them from the cold water. The air flow and river current power the kite boarders. They skim the ridges of whitecaps. Gulls bob on the swells. Ravens careen in the sky. Their iridescent wings blink on and off as they wheel and turn in the eddies of wind.

Elsewhere, Ukraine and Russia continue to clobber one another. One step forward for the aggressor, one push back for the defender. In Gaza, atrocity follows atrocity, as it has for decades and likely will for decades to come. Syria and Myanmar are equally discombobulated. Both hold themselves hostage to what have become never ending wars. Generations age and pass away, strangers to peace. 

Here in America, political adversaries grapple in their own Civil War scrum. For the moment, it’s words only. But, for some, the rhetoric portends violence. Simple arithmetic from the last presidential election is disputed without evidence. False narratives abound. Truth seems to be an option. Bellicose threats of revenge intimidate those who dare to question the lies. Propaganda and paranoia create pandemonium. Fear, the cudgel of a bully, pummels our shared longings. 

I’m not immune to the noise. I’m sometimes troubled by all this manufactured rancor. Worries emanate in the thin air of skepticism. Doubts fester. I don’t trust us to do the right thing. News outlets are not helpful. They spread anxiety. They wallow in the quicksand of negativity. Our culture considers calamity to be a commodity.

Normally, I’m capable of remaining aloof from the ass-quackery of politics. Yet, it seems we’re being conditioned to expect the worst from prospective leaders. Anger is the soup du jour. It’s difficult to look away from the human wreckage. It’s easy to be overwhelmed by the volume of this hostility. 

I try to escape the commotion. I seek silence. I find it, momentarily, within a forest near my home. I wander among trees that are hundreds of years old. I pause at a bench that looks over the river canyon. A woodland grows there in quiet harmony. The conifers tower, like sages, above the babbling of humanity. The crowns of the trees sway in the breeze. They sigh farewell to time as it passes. They exist indifferent to mankind’s folly.

I slow down. I take deep breaths. Reflection is a privilege bestowed upon the elderly. We’ve seen variations of the current hysteria in times past. Think of Vietnam in tandem with civil rights, Watergate, and the assassinations of the sixties. That was also quite a hullabaloo.

No matter what, the earth rotates on its axis. Days follow nights. We orbit the sun. One season becomes another. On my porch, adjacent to my bedroom, the wind stirs and musical chimes sing. A gamelan of metal and bamboo serenade my dreams. I relax. I sleep.

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