Wednesday, May 21, 2025
D+175/120
1956 WITI TV channel 6 in Milwaukee began broadcasting
1964 The US began intelligence flights above Laos
\\1972 Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome was damaged by a vandal
1979 Dan White was convicted of the voluntary manslaughter of San Francisco mayor George Moscone and openly gay councilor Harvey Milk. The conviction on a lesser charge outraged the gay community and led to the White Night riots.
In bed around 9:30, awake at 4, and up at 4:27. 46°, wind chill 35°, high of 48°. Rainy conditions all day, like yesterday. 1 inch of rain in the last 24 hours, 0.65 in. expected in the next 24 hours. NE wind, very uncomfortable.
Prednisone, day 371; 1 mg., day 13/21; Kevzara, day 9/14; CGM, day 4/15; Trulicity, day 5/7. Prednisone at 4:45 a.m. Other meds at 8:35 a.m. Triamcinolone at 8:10 a.m. Eye drops at 5 a.m., 2 p.m., and 9 p.m.
Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Picasso, O'Keeffe, Pickles, and Clausen!!!😂
Minnows in the bait bucket
1. We act as if Mexico is a great danger to us because of its heavily armed drug cartels. Why don't we realize and admit that we are a great danger to Mexico because of our massive drug purchases and gun sales? No purchases = no sales. No sales = no sellers.
2. Last night's film was on MUBI, from Columbia, 2015, Land and Shade or La Tierra y La Sombra, the story of a family, a grandfather who left the family farm years ago but returns to help as his son is dying of lung disease from living and working on a sugar cane plantation. Simple in the extreme, but a powerful critique of the family's and the land's movement from agrarian farming to corporate, capitalist sugarcane production. The land destroys its workers. who are wage slaves with no worker welfare protection, and the plantation economics destroys the land.
3. Yesterday afternoon, after painting Charlotte, I re-watched the third episode of Adolescence, the episode in which the psychologist interviewed Jamie. Incredibly powerful acting by the 15-year-old Owen Cooper as a 13 or 14-year-old Jamie Miller.
4. As I got out of bed this morning, I thought of Geri's leaving tomorrow for her well-deserved visit with her lifelong friends, Kate Dugan Donovan and 'Tuzz' McAvoy Healy. I realized that I am already feeling a bit forlorn or bereft, anticipating how empty our home and my life will seem without her presence. I recalled how I felt when I was living at the Knickerbocker and she left for the job in Seattle. I was happy for her and very much wanted her to take the job, but once she was gone and I was alone, I realized that the empty, sad feeling I experienced was what is meant by the word 'forlorn.' She will be away for only 5 days on this trip, including two travel days, and I very much want her to go and to enjoy the reunion. Long-term friendships are treasures and a credit to those who maintain them, but I expect I will be a leaden lump while she's gone, especially without Lilly to keep me company. (How we both miss her.) We've spent more than 40 years together, and I'm not worth much without her in my daily life. I think of our friend Micaela and her long struggle with loneliness and lack of companionship since Tom died. I think of the DNR discussion with Dr. Saladi and the possibility that Geri could have left Zablocki that day a widow, like Caela. I think of Jimmy Aquavia without Nancy, Jimmy Cummings with his Nancy, my Dad without my Mom, and I realize how much we couples do indeed bond with each other, a bit like chemical bonding, very different from mere mixing. We're something different together from what we are individually, perhaps not like water is different from hydrogen and oxygen, but still . . .
5. I rarely really read the morning papers anymore. I used to read them pretty thoroughly, at least reading all the headlines to see whether there was an article of interest buried behind the front page or lead stories. New York Times, Washington Post, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker, every morning. Sometimes the Wall Street Journal, sometimes The Independent out of London. Now I only look at the headlines of the main stories and then read only a few of them. Donald Trump has succeeded in dominating the headlines and the column inches of the print media and the bulk of broadcast news. I realize that most news is bad news (murders, fires, floods, etc.), but there is something not merely depressing but frightening about Trump news. We can accept the fact that devastating 'acts of God' will occur, and that random acts of criminality occur, but in Trumpnews, we are witnessing the planned, purposeful destruction of the country's constitutional order which, imperfect as it is, is infinitely preferqble to Trumpian autocracy, autocracy, and plutocracy. We are witnessing the creation of the world our children and grandchildren will live in, under not merely an always imperfect government but a cruel and indecent one. I avoid reading the news about it for the same reason I avoid negotiating the basement stairs, because it's painful and threatening, and there is little I can do about it.
6. Having said I rarely read newspaper articles anymore, I read an op-ed by Dr. Racael Bedard in this morning's NY Times, "Denial Is a Bad Strategy if You’re an Aging President." It's about 82-year-old Joe Biden's situation with his metastatic prostate cancer, and also, by inference, about 78-year-old Donald Trump's situation. It's also indirectly about me approaching age 84. For us people of advanced age, and especially for those of us who are also frail, Dr. Bedard endorses hoping for the best and planning for the worst. She warns against using the psychological defense mechanism of DENIAL, a refusal to honestly acknowledge and face up to the existence of a painful or threatening condition, like a child covering his eyes. Dr. Bedard is, I think, way too gentle in opining "it’s hard not to think that he, and the people around him, were partly operating out of denial." In the almost three years that I have been keeping these daily notes, I have often written harshly about Joe Biden, his ego, his narcissism, his lust for power, prestige, and status. I have compared him to Trump, although Trump is infinitely more culpable. Reading this op-ed by a geriatrician and palliative care physician drives home again how profoundly selfish, imprudent, and dangerous it was for Biden to run for reelection, and for his wife, son, and intimates to defend and encourage him. He, more than anyone other than Trump himself, will be blamed, and justly so, for all the evils that follow upon Trump's second term of office.
“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Does Donald Trump obey the First Commandment? Does he love God above everything? Does he love his neighbor as himself? What gods reign in the White House? What gods reign in Congress? Who or what is Elon Musk's god? How is it possible that Trump, Musk, and their acolytes have the support of people who call themselves Christians? From today's New York Times:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth led a Christian prayer service in the Pentagon’s auditorium on Wednesday morning, during working hours, in which President Trump was praised as a divinely appointed leader.
The event, billed as the “Secretary of Defense Christian Prayer & Worship Service,” was standing room only and ran for about 30 minutes, with Brooks Potteiger, the pastor of Mr. Hegseth’s church in Tennessee, as the main speaker.
It is unclear whether the Defense Department has hosted similar religious events outside of the Pentagon’s chapel, which was added after the 9/11 attack, but the service is part of an increasing infusion of overt Christian evangelization in official government events during Mr. Trump’s second term.
“This is precisely where I need to be, and I think exactly where we need to be as a nation, at this moment,” Mr. Hegseth, standing at a lectern bearing the seal of the Defense Department, said in his opening remarks: “in prayer, on bended knee recognizing the providence of our lord and savior Jesus Christ.” He added, “Knowing that there’s an author in heaven overseeing all of this, who’s underwritten all of it, for us, on the cross, gives me the strength to proceed.”
“King Jesus, we come humbly before you, seeking your face, seeking your grace, in humble obedience to your law and to your word,” Mr. Hegseth prayed after asking attendees to bow their heads. “We come as sinners saved only by that grace, seeking your providence in our lives and in our nation. Lord God, we ask for the wisdom to see what is right and in each and every day, in each and every circumstance, the courage to do what is right in obedience to your will. It is in the name of our lord and savior, Jesus Christ, that we pray. And all God’s people say amen.”
In his sermon, the pastor [Potteiger] said, “We pray for our leaders who you have sovereignly appointed — for President Trump, thank you for the way that you have used him to bring stability and moral clarity to our land. And we pray that you would continue to protect him, bless him, give him great wisdom.” He added: “We pray that you would surround him with faithful counselors who fear your name and love your priesthoods.”
As I often say, God help us, but we know he won't. That's the bad news. I suppose the good news is that we can't blame him. We have done this to ourselves.
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