It is a beautiful afternoon in October in Claverack. The leaves that fill my vision as I sit here on the deck are golden and some fallen ones float regally down the creek toward the pond.
It was a day when I had an enormously difficult time waking up; every time the alarm went off, I hit the snooze button. Finally, I staggered out of bed and into the day. Slightly ambivalent about going to church, I reminded myself of the bag of groceries I had purchased for the Food Pantry at the Church and so I made my way there, a little late but still there.
From church, I made my way to the Dot for Eggs Benedict on potato latkes. And then home to wait for my friend Larry to arrive, bringing me some wood from his farm for my winter woodstove fires.
He and I sat on the deck after it was stacked, and admired the beauty of the place, enjoying the moment while listening to jazz. He has now left and I am here, at the end of the afternoon, still listening to jazz and enjoying the beauty of the spot, the moment, and basking in the long friendship Larry and I have enjoyed, stretching back now more than thirty years.
It is always easy here to slip into an avoidance of the world. This is a place of tranquility.
Beyond here – and sometimes I do not want to move beyond here – the world is a mess.
Aleppo is being pulverized and no one seems to know how to stop it. Assad and Putin seem to have no respect or care for the citizens trapped there. It is a strategic notch they need in their belts and so the dying continues. Reports indicate Aleppo looks like Berlin in 1945, a decimated city.
Donald Trump has once more been skewered on Saturday Night Live, not that Hillary got off easily. He has denounced the performance in his famous tweets.
He has increasingly been declaring that the election process is rigged. Some observers think that if he loses he is doing his best to delegitimize a Clinton Presidency.
It is rumored that the CIA is preparing a major cyberattack against Russia for its alleged attacks on American institutions, including the Democratic Party. This is a new kind of warfare.
And in thinking of a new world, a friend told me that every year from now on, 3% of jobs will be lost to robots. I think I’m glad I am at the place in life I am. It will be interesting to see how all of this shakes out.
Soon, I will let you know how my experience with Cozmo goes. It should arrive this week.
It is supposed to learn from me how to react to me. A robot pet of sorts, I guess, and I couldn’t resist experimenting with it.
Cozmo is my birthday present to myself.
Letter from the Vineyard 
Letter From Claverack 03 07 2017 A day late but not necessarily a dollar short…
March 8, 2017Written yesterday, having fallen into the arms of Morpheus before I could post or email…
This has been a very hygge kind of day. There is a document I need to deliver to the Miller Center and I have been cozied up in the cottage all day working on it. Outside, it has been drear, chill and damp. Inside, it’s been warm and comfortable.
Waking, I started a fire in the Franklin Stove to help take the chill off the cottage.
Yesterday, I had started working on a document I owe the Miller Center on the Presidency and today I worked to complete the first draft so I could hone it tomorrow and send it off to them.
Since 7:00 this morning, I have been working. First, I curled up in bed and handled the voluminous number of emails I receive. Then I made coffee in my Clever Coffee Dripper, a new investment on my search for a great cup of morning coffee. [Not bad…]
Since 9 this morning, I have been huddled over my laptop, working, sorting through a variety of documents, making sense of thoughts I’ve had. It’s been good, exhausting but good.
It’s lovely to stretch my mind and this has been one of the greatest stretches of my recent time, putting together media recommendations for the Miller Center for the Presidency at this exact moment in time.
Wow! Juicy good.
Every morning I wake up and wonder what has happened while I’m asleep. While it makes some of my friends crazy angry, I can’t do that. It’s more like: Wow! At least to me.
There is a new Republican plan to repeal and replace Obamacare and in reading articles right now, it seems DOA. Conservative Republicans hate it; Democrats despise it and to some it doesn’t make much sense. The games have begun and we’re off to the races.
Yikes. It’s a mess.
As is the claim by President Trump that former President Obama ordered wiretaps on Trump Tower. The President has offered no back-up to his claim and has, per Sean Spicer, no regrets about his tweets.
Oh, dear.
Some of my friends wake up apoplectic about all of this. I don’t. History is playing out and I am very curious about history will play out. It is incredible what is happening.
While the Trump allegations are playing out, Wikileaks has dumped a huge amount of information which lets us know that the CIA has been monitoring us through our Smart TVs, our phones and our cars.
We can’t blame this on Trump. This has been going on before him. Call me shocked. What’s been going on? Glad I don’t have a Smart TV but I do have a Smart Phone. Wonder what they know about me?
This feels very “1984,” a book by George Orwell that became very popular after the Trump election. All of this, though, started before that.
I, Joe Average Citizen, and I am a Joe Average Citizen, seem to have discovered my government is routinely spying on me and I am perturbed by that.
Really perturbed…
What world am I living in? Has the CIA become the Stasi? I am immensely confused by the world I am living in as it is not the world I expected.
Call me naïve. Call me stupid. The CIA is watching our Smart TV’s? My Smart Phone?
Wowza, that scary sci-fi future is here.
And so I am at home, doing my best to assimilate all this and also doing my best to be very hygge. And it has been a hygge kind of day.
Great jazz. Working on a project for which I have passion, fire in the Franklin Stove, watching the gray day slip by. That has been hygge. We need it, I suspect, in a world that seems to have gone mad around me.
Electing Hillary Clinton would have carried us safely down the stream for a while. Donald Trump is forcing us to confront our democracy.
Oh, dear.
Tags:1984, CIA, Clever Coffee Dripper, Donald Trump, Franklin Stove, George Orwell, Hillary Clinton, Hygge, Jazz, Joe Average Citizen, Miller Center for the Presidency, Morpheus, NSA, Obamacare, Trump, Trump Tower Wiretaps, Wikileaks
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