The personal memoir service my oldest daughter enrolled me in, StoryWorth, posed a useful question today: "What advice would you give your 20-year-old self?"
As it turns out, I happen to have a child who is turning 23 in a few days and we just happened to have had lunch yesterday. She works for Americorps in the San Francisco public school system.
I'd like to report that I gave her the sage advice of a father five decades further on in life's journey. You know, pearls of wisdom culled from an extra half-century of enduring the school of hard knocks.
But I did no such thing. Instead, I listened as she described the world from her point of view, a world where the young children she works with have been deeply affected by the pandemic and are struggling to catch up intellectually and socially.
She also described a world of deep inequality, where not enough idealistic young people can even afford to live in San Francisco to fill out the opportunities offered there by Americorps (which is the domestic equivalent to the Peace Corps).
She knows she is one of the privileged ones, since she can afford to do this work for a while. She also could move into a far more lucrative private sector role if she chose to do so. As a fresh college graduate from an elite private university, she has a broad range of choices in front of her.
Her choice for now is to work with these children on a stipend.
During our conversation over lunch in a Bernal care, and afterward on a long walk through the city, she turned out to be the one who had some sage advice for me -- about the things I should consider doing or not doing to improve my situation, ways to achieve self-awareness as I navigate my own uncertain future.
As I listened, I noted the mixture of idealism and pragmatism that motivates her at this stage of her life. And I was moved by her caring and her thoughtfulness. I couldn't help but wonder what I might have been like at her age.
There *are* parallels, of course. I was a Peace Corps teacher in Afghanistan.
Riding on Bart afterward, I thought about how age may be over-rated when to comes to wisdom. Maybe the next StoryWorth question should be: "What advice would your 20-year-old self give to you?
***
On Sunday storm clouds finally moved into the BayArea. They blew in actually, a welcome development.
This, as we have largely escaped the wildfire smoke that darkened the skies a year ago, which is a local comfort, even as we know others in Canada, Oregon, parts of California and various parts of Europe had terrible wildfires.
It was nearly sundown when the rains started falling, enough to further tamp down the fire hazard in these parts. And meteorologists say we have 3-6 more inches coming later this week.
***
THE HEADLINES:
* Colin Powell, who served Democratic and Republican presidents in war and peace but whose sterling reputation was forever stained by his faulty claims to justify the U.S. war in Iraq, died Monday of COVID-19 complications. He was 84. (AP)
* Iran to host multilateral conference on Afghanistan on October 27 -- In addition to Iran and Russia, the meeting will be attended by China, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, who all have land borders with Afghanistan. (Al Jazeera)
* Threats, Resignations and 100 New Laws: Why Public Health Is in Crisis -- An examination of hundreds of health departments around the country shows that the nation may be less prepared for the next pandemic than it was for the current one. (NYT)
* Returning Workers Confront Creepy Time Capsules of Pre-Pandemic Life (WSJ)
* Murder trial in Ahmaud Arbery case to test racial reckoning (WP)
* Community leaders in Brunswick, Georgia, are preaching unity ahead of the trial of three white men accused of racially motivated murder in the shotgun death of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery, anxious it does not stir racial tensions or violent protests in their small coastal city. (Reuters)
* 4.3 Million Workers Are Missing. Where Did They Go? (WSJ)
* As Manchin Blocks Climate Plan, His State Can’t Hold Back Floods -- As the senator thwarts Democrats’ major push to reduce warming, new data shows West Virginia is more exposed to worsening floods than anywhere else in the country. (NYT)
* Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) said Sunday that former President Donald Trump’s obsession with the 2020 election is “not constructive” and could spell disaster for the GOP in the 2022 midterms. And Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said he would not vote for Trump if he ran for president again in 2024. Despite the high-profile defections, most Republicans have fallen into lockstep behind Trump's lies about his defeat or are silent. [HuffPost]
* Five U.S. lawmakers have accused Amazon of possibly lying to Congress; the accusation follows a Reuters investigation revealing how the company ran a systematic campaign in India of copying products and manipulating search results. (Reuters)
* As Japan’s yakuza mob weakens, former gangsters struggle to find a role outside crime (WP)
* For Uber and Lyft, the Rideshare Bubble Bursts -- Rideharing companies made a lot of promises. They’re not being kept. (NYT)
* Fire crews make big gains against Southern California blaze (AP)
* Oil prices hit their highest level in years as demand recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, boosted by more custom from power generators turning away from expensive gas and coal to fuel oil and diesel. (Reuters)
* Voting rights advocate Stacey Abrams urged Black churchgoers to turn out for Democrat Terry McAuliffe in next month’s Virginia governor’s election, saying that what happens in the most watched race this year will “show the world who we are” in future contests with even higher stakes. Democrats want to ensure that a state trending increasingly Democratic in recent years doesn't flip back to the Republican column. [AP]
* Metro suspends more than half of its trains after investigation uncovers safety issues (WP)
* China's economy hit its slowest pace of growth in a year in the third quarter, hurt by power shortages, supply chain bottlenecks and major wobbles in the property market and raising pressure on policymakers to do more to prop up the faltering recovery. (Reuters)
* A threat to ancient trees: Sequoia and King’s Canyon National Parks have some of the highest ozone levels in the nation, thanks to smog that blows in other areas, (Wired).* Despite a Punishing Drought, San Diego Has Water. It Wasn’t Easy. -- Sustainability measures that the city and county have taken over decades are paying off. (NYT)
* Lake Tahoe’s water supply is so low that it is no longer flowing into the Truckee River, keeping kokanee salmon from spawning in a major tributary. (LAT)
* Does Vitamin D Help With Seasonal Affective Disorder? (HuffPost)
* Facebook plans to hire 10,000 in the European Union over the next five years, the social media giant said, to help build the so-called metaverse - a nascent online world where people exist and communicate in shared virtual spaces. (Reuters)
* It’s strange Superman was ever straight to begin with (WP)
* Biden’s Plans Raise Questions About What U.S. Can Afford Not to Do -- Democrats are debating whether doing nothing will cost more than doing something to deal with climate change, education, child care, prescription drugs and more. (NYT)
* Entire Facebook Staff Laughs As Man Tightens Privacy Settings (The Onion)
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