This One Moment

I don't know about you, but for now I'm going to hold on to the illusion that the pandemic is over, while trying not to become irresponsible in my behavior.

It is just too delicious to openly socialize with people in our houses or the cafes and restaurants that are open now. Doing so has started to bring back a vitality to my daily life that was lacking for too long. 

There's a certain urgency behind my need to "network" and connect again. Not for professional reasons any longer, but for much deeper reasons. Let me explain.

I came close enough to dying two years ago to get a sense of what that will be like. And for many, many months afterward I had trouble going to sleep at night -- I was afraid I wouldn't ever wake up again. This was what you could call a severe sleep disorder if it needs a name. For at least a year, maybe longer, I woke up every other hour all night long as if my brain was programmed by a checklist.

"Yep, 3 a.m., still alive. Okay, you can go back to sleep now."

As if that would work.

Eventually after hundreds of nights of waking up over and over, something started to change. Slowly, and I mean really slowly, I gave up the worrying about dying bit.

Since it hadn't happened yet, I reasoned, it must not be all that easy to do -- the dying part, that is. Then I had an epiphany: It wasn't the fear of dying that was keeping me awake, it was the fear of not living.

Two sides of the same coin perhaps, but two very different sides.

Since I'd survived serious health problems, I now rather desperately wanted to feel completely alive again, to experience the things I'd been fortunate enough to know previously. This epiphany, of course, will strike anyone more savvy than I will ever be as rather pathetic and obvious, but it was also clear that something besides not dying was keeping me from fully living, at least the way I yearned to do.

And that something was Covid-19.

Not being able to freely move about, see people, meet people, share moments, have conversations, fall in love -- all of that had been placed into a state of suspension.

So I started to write about it. I wrote and wrote and wrote some more. I became the virtual Forest Gump of writers. Write, David, write. As I posted my writings on Facebook, more and more people started to respond, until I spent as much time every day corresponding with people as I did with writing.

In the process, I realized that only a minority of the new friends I was making via social media were other journalists, because they asked basic but crucial questions about the news, especially Covid. So I decided to research the pandemic and seek out articles from a wide variety of sources that might answer some of my Facebook friends' questions.

That led in a natural way to an unconscious decision to just go ahead and start aggregating all the news that mattered on a daily basis. After all, it was an election year. And since I'd been doing this already for the better part for a half-century, it wasn't much trouble and maybe it would prove a service to people who felt uncertain what information they could trust among all of the stuff circulating out there.

And there is a lot of stuff circulating out there in this Internet Age, much of it useless or worse -- dangerous.

Fast forward a year or so, most of us have gotten vaccinated and life has started to return to what we used to consider normal. I could cease my efforts to process the news but by now it has become too ingrained in my daily routine for me to tinker with it. Like most people, I am a creature of habit, albeit in my case, some fairly weird habits, like reading hundreds of news stories when nobody pays me to do that.

Anyway, back to my point, if I have a point, much more recently I started sleeping almost all the way through the night. I stopped worrying about dying, because now I am focusing much more on getting enough rest so I can be ready for the excitement the following day may bring.

And I'm really enjoying this living in the moment thing.

Life is precious, but not infinite, and it's certainly not always pleasant or simple. Some days it is complicated and messy. I have all the old yearnings and heartaches I have always had. And of course no one can say how much longer we have until the masks will return (they already are in some places) as well as the new variant after delta that may bring all of this happiness to a screeching halt.

If and when that happens, we'll all be sad. And we'll have to hunker down again.

But I know one thing -- until then, I ain't gettin' cheated!

***

While I was writing the above, the disturbing news about vaccinated people in Massachusetts getting sick broke, and the inability the government to convince the unvaccinated to save themselves has become clear.

That we may be teetering on the verge of a new surge makes getting together with friends and loved ones all the more urgent. So don't put those plans off. If you do, they may go into a holding pattern before the next window for seeing each other opens up again.

THE HEADLINES:

* World Economy Roars Back From Covid-19 Collapse --The world economy likely returned to its pre-pandemic size in the spring, according to economists, but new variants of Covid-19 are casting a cloud over the global expansion. (WSJ) 

* How Europe, After a Fumbling Start, Overtook the U.S. in Vaccination -- Just a few months ago, European Union efforts were a mess, but its problems were temporary. The United States turned out to have the more lasting challenge. (NYT)

* CDC document cites delta variant’s ability to spread among the vaccinated -- Scientists were so alarmed by the new research cited in the internal document, obtained by The Washington Post, that the agency significantly changed mask guidance for vaccinated people even before making the data public. (WP)

* What Makes the Delta Variant So Dangerous for Unvaccinated People --A unique combination of mutations has led to this more infectious version of the coronavirus, prompting revised mask guidelines. (WSJ)

* As new school year looms, debates over mask mandates stir anger and confusion (WP)

* Biden Seeks to Revive Vaccine Effort With New Rules and Incentives -- The president said those refusing to get a coronavirus shot should expect inconveniences as long as they decline a vaccine. (NYT)

* Mass. outbreak mostly infected the vaccinated, CDC study finds (WP)

* What if the Unvaccinated Can’t Be Persuaded? -- To reach herd immunity, we need a different approach. (NYT)

* Where People Are Most Vulnerable to the Delta Variant -- Estimates show much of the country is still susceptible to the kind of rapid spread that can put stress on hospitals and lead to worse outcomes for patients. (NYT) 

* States race to use COVID-19 vaccines before they expire (AP)

* The amount of Greenland ice that melted on Tuesday could cover Florida in 2 inches of water. (CNN) 

* Another heat wave will hit the Pacific Northwest late this week and continue into this weekend, which could make the Bootleg fire in southern Oregon and the Dixie fire in Northern California even harder to control. The Dixie fire has burned 220,000 acres so far. (California Today)

* Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) is set to introduce bold legislation today that would create a guaranteed income program in the U.S. to send $1,200 a month directly to most Americans. Her measure would fund pilot programs in hundreds of communities, then start a national program in 2028. [HuffPost]

* A lot of politics lie ahead — but Congress negotiated a pretty good infrastructure deal (WP)

* How Biden Got the Infrastructure Deal Trump Couldn’t -- The early success of the deal vindicated the president’s faith in bipartisanship. If he can keep it on track, it will help affirm the rationale for his presidency. (NYT)

* Police shootings continue daily, despite a pandemic, protests and pushes for reform (WP)

* When Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) took the stage on Jan. 6 to rile up Donald Trump supporters ahead of their violent siege of the U.S. Capitol, he was wearing body armor under his windbreaker. [HuffPost]

* U.S. flies 200 Afghan interpreters and family members to Virginia, in first wave of evacuations (WP)

* These Herders Lived in Peaceful Isolation. Now, War Has Found Them. -- Accompanied by their livestock, hundreds tried to flee the Wakhan Corridor, a mountainous region of Afghanistan now threatened by the Taliban. But they were turned back by northern neighbors (NYT)

* The Last Days of Osama bin Laden (WSJ)

* A New Tunnel Is Spotted At A Chinese Nuclear Test Site (NPR) 

* Is the Loch Ness Monster Just a Lovesick Sturgeon? Some Fans Don’t Want to Know (WSJ)

* Encouragement Of Family, Friends Motivating Man To Keep Struggling Indefinitely (The Onion)

***

"Your Cheatin' Heart"

Song by Drifting Cowboys (aka Hank Williams)

Songwriters: Lovetta Pippen / Fred Thomas / Warren Michael Defever

Your cheatin' heart will make you weep
You'll cry and cry and try to sleep
But sleep won't come
The whole night through
Your cheatin' heart will tell on you

When tears come down like fallin' rain
You'll toss around and call my name
You'll walk the floor the way I do
Your cheatin' heart will tell on you

Your cheatin' heart will pine someday
And crave the love you threw away
The time will come when you'll be blue
Your cheatin' heart will tell on you

When tears come down like fallin' rain
You'll toss around and call my name
You'll walk the floor the way I do
Your cheatin' heart will tell on you

The Smile

On Thursday the excitement around home was when a film crew stopped by to interview me about people and events from a time long ago. At one point they wanted to get some footage of me sitting at a table writing my daily essay.

They also asked my ten-year-old granddaughter to hover over my shoulder and watch me type.

She is a little shy, but not overly so, so she agreed. As she held the pose, I wrote the first words that popped into my mind. None of it was planned. Those words turned out to be the conversation I would like to have with her about life if we were ever to do that.

Here is what I wrote:

"So the most important thing I could ever say to you while you are still young is don't waste it. Don't waste it because it won't come around again.

"This sounds like a cliche and of course it is. But not all cliches are dumb.

"Double digits (your age) ... they only start once. If you live long enough you may make triple digits. But that is only for the chosen few so my advice is to treasure the two-digit stretch as long as you can, from age ten to ninety nine.

"Pace yourself. Life is way shorter than we'd ultimately like it to be. Most people live at high speed and ignore the stops. But the rest stops are special in their own way. They are when you can breathe, reflect.

"And look up and see where you are going.

"What else? Maybe just this: Each and every one of us is special in our own way...So live your life as if it really matters! Follow your passion. Don't settle for less. Your dreams may or may not come true but they definitely won't come true if you don't try..."

***

At about this point the director called "Cut" and it was a wrap. The crew took Sophia to another room to sign the standard release form in case they use her image in the upcoming documentary. 

She came back and brought the form to me to sign. "Just put down that you are my Grandpa."

"Thanks for helping out with this, Sophia, and welcome to Hollywood," I told her. "What was it like for you?"

"Well I tried to stay still and look serious as long as I could. But I was reading what you wrote and I just had to smile. So I did. And then the man said 'cut'."

Of course she is too young to know it yet but the moment she smiled was the one he was waiting for. And I'm sure if she's in the doc that will make the final cut.

***

One of the sad headlines catching my eye today is the wave of assassinations of Afghan pilots by the Taliban. In a poor society like Afghanistan, highly trained professionals like pilots are hard to develop and harder to retain.

For one thing they have to train overseas, where the working conditions and benefits are much better than back home, but the need is much greater there. Fifty years ago, when I lived in Afghanistan, there were only a handful of commercial pilots in the country and only a few aged planes for them to fly on domestic routes.

I knew one of these guys, named Omar, and on occasion he would invite me into the cockpit as he piloted our flight over the mighty Hindu Kush from Kabul to the north, probably to Mazar-i-Sharif or Kunduz.

It was a two-engine plane and as we sailed not very far above the jagged snow-covered peaks, it felt like we were on the edge of heaven. I asked Omar what would happen if one of the engines should fail.

"That would be it for us," he answered. "There is nowhere down there for us to land. Allahu Akbar. (God is Great)."

For heaven's sake, why are the Taliban killing the society's few pilots? Probably to cripple the government's military capacity as they proceed to take over the country and send it back to the Stone Age.

God save the Afghan people from themselves. God save Afghan women from these frightful misogynists. 

***

THE HEADLINES:

* Is This the End of Summer as We’ve Known It? -- Wildfires. Drought. Monsoons. Sewage spills. A resurgent virus. The summer season we thought we knew has become something ominous. (NYT)

* Climate Change Is Driving Deadly Weather Disasters From Arizona To Mumbai (NPR)

* A new video is highlighting the devastating effect of recent heat waves on Pacific Northwest salmon, which are suffering from lesions and fungus due to rising water temperatures, according to a nonprofit organization. Unusually warm temperatures have already been blamed for mass salmon deaths and illness. [HuffPost]

* A nearly empty water reservoir, increasing temperatures in the Sierra Nevada and dry winters are leaving Santa Clara County (Silicon Valley) residents to endure one of the worst droughts in modern history. (KQED)

* Survivors of California’s deadliest wildfire feel haunted as new blaze nears: ‘I can’t do it again’ (WP)

* ‘The war has changed’: Internal CDC document urges new messaging, warns delta infections likely more severe (WP)

* Pandemic Aid Programs Spur a Record Drop in Poverty -- The most comprehensive study yet of the federal response to the pandemic shows huge but temporary benefits for the poor — and helps frame a larger debate over the role of government. (NYT)

* New York City Offers $100 Incentive to Get Vaccinated (AP)

* 8 Lasting Changes Experts Think We'll See In Kids After This 'Lost' Year (HuffPost)

* Wearing Masks Indoors Again? Some States Are a Vehement No. -- After the C.D.C. advised masking indoors in areas with high rates of Covid-19, some locales went back under mask mandates. But there was also defiance and hostility. (NYT)

* CDC reversal on indoor masking prompts experts to ask: Where’s the data? (WP)

* Citing New Data, Pfizer Outlines Case for Booster Shots -- Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine may become slightly weaker over time, the company reported. But experts said that most people won’t need boosters anytime soon. (NYT)

* On the advice of the congressional physician, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) reinstated a mask mandate for House lawmakers and staff amid the spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus. House Republicans responded with fighting and yelling, with Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), trying and failing to get the House to adjourn for the day on Wednesday because he didn't want to wear a mask. [HuffPost]

* In the Capitol, Revival of Mask Mandate Ignites Partisan Recriminations (NYT)

* U.S. Economy Grew Past Pre-Pandemic Level, but Variant Clouds Outlook (WSJ)

* $1 Trillion Infrastructure Deal Scales Senate Hurdle With Bipartisan Vote  -- The vote was a breakthrough after weeks of wrangling among White House officials and senators in both parties, clearing the way for action on a top priority for President Biden. (NYT)

* A Saudi official’s harrowing account of torture reveals the regime’s brutality (WP)

* Taliban assassinations of Afghan pilots 'worrisome,' U.S. govt watchdog says (Reuters)

* China Offers the Taliban a Warm Welcome While Urging Peace Talks (NYT)

* As bipartisanship reigns in U.S. Senate, Republicans rage in House (Reuters)

* The Trial of Chesa Boudin -- Can a progressive young DA survive a political backlash in San Francisco? (New Yorker)

* Feel free to enjoy that coffee without worrying about your heart, new research says (WP)

* Biden wants U.S automakers to pledge 40% electric vehicles by 2030 -sources (Reuters)

* Report: Everyone Starting New Exciting Stage Of Life Except You (The Onion)

***

"Thank Heaven For Little Girls"

Song by Maurice Chevalier

Songwriters: Alan Jay Lerner / Frederick Loewe

Each time I see a little girl
Of five or six or seven
I can't resist a joyous urge
To smile and say
Thank heaven for little girls
For little girls get
Bigger every day
Thank heaven for little girls
They grow up in 
The most delightful way.
Those little eyes 
So helpless and appealing
When they were flashing
Send you crashing
Through the ceiling
Thank heaven for little girls
Thank heaven for them all
No matter where,
No matter who
Without them
What would little boys do
Thank heaven 
Thank heaven
Thank heaven for little girls.

-30-

"You Got to Please Yourself"

What it all boils down to is so simple that you can be forgiven for wondering whether all those years of therapy, that Master's degree in philosophy, or those spiritual retreats at the spas were worth the trouble.

It turns out that life is short. So enjoy the moment, pursue your passions. There is no other secret. Respect all life around you.

You probably heard some version of these truisms from your mother or maybe a wizened mentor along the way, but something always led you to discount the simple advice. The life that you aspired to live was supposed to be much more complicated than that, right? 

In my case I did none of those things, save for the therapy, and I didn't have any particular aspirations that I can recall now. But I do know that it is a blessing to work with people who do, like entrepreneurs chasing their dreams. Or to comfort friends after their greatest dreams have been crushed. The blessing is to be there when it matters.

Most people I know go through decades and decades of living like it is going to go on forever, and ultimately pile up a long list of regrets by the time they realize it is not.

I once started a screenplay with a line I was very proud of at the time; "There are two kinds of regret. Regret for things that you did. Regret for things you didn't do. And I'm not sure at this point which is worse."

Obviously I was creating a character who was looking back on his life, seeking to explain it to himself, or perhaps to others.

Well, the movie never got made and the line has since been stolen, I'm sure, by somebody somewhere, but that's one of those things I don't really regret either. It was a great line at the time.

***

When I started publishing these daily essays at the beginning of the pandemic, the most common feedback I received was that my memories resonated with some people as sweet, nostalgic, even mournful.

I'm always grateful for feedback of any kind actually, but this seemed like an odd reaction to me. Since Facebook on a daily basis resurfaces those early essays to me as my "memories" (as if I could have forgotten them) I do see now why people may have thought I was looking backward when I wrote.

That is not the case. I try to only looking forward. If life is short, and it is -- way too short --why should I bother with the past when there is truly nothing I can do about it? Oh, I suppose one could issue a few apologies here or there, or get revenge on those who wronged us, or try to recreate our past glories.

But life truly is a bit too short for that.

My own past is littered with happiness, success, triumphs, failures, loss, and pain. Good and bad roughly in balance, you could say. For me, all of this is mushed together as a kind of gooey fuel that propels me forward as a writer.

In this context, I love the stories people tell in any form, however imperfect, and one that comes to mind is Ricky Nelson's plaintive ballad "Garden Party," where the '60s pop star recounted playing before a huge crowd in an attempted comeback at Madison Square Garden in 1972.

The concert was a disaster and the crowd booed him off the stage.

Or at least he thought they were booing him. It turns out they may have been booing the police who were controlling restive members of the crowd. But he didn't learn that until too late.

By then he had written and released the song, which was his version of that night -- that the crowd couldn't handle the fact that he had changed his look and his sound; in other words, that he had evolved. They were disoriented but he'd moved on from his role as a TV teen idol.

The best line in the song is  "If memories were all I sang, I'd rather drive a truck." 

That turned out to be his last hit, but he kept performing it at bars and clubs and a few concert halls until he died at age 45 in a plane crash on the way to yet another New Year's Eve concert. 

***

"If memories were all I wrote, I'd rather not write at all."

I said that.

***

THE HEADLINES:

* First sign of animal life on Earth may be a sponge fossil -- A Canadian geologist may have found the earliest fossil record of animal life on Earth, according to a report published Wednesday in the journal Nature. (AP)

* The Radical Courage of Simone Biles's Exit from the Team USA Olympic Finals (New Yorker)

* Pandemic takes toll on athlete mental health at Tokyo Games (Reuters)

* Mental health and physical health shouldn’t be seen as two separate entities. When Biles decided to look after her mental health, toxic people on the internet weighed in. But not a single person would bat an eye if Biles had to leave the Olympics because of a broken ankle, writes Lindsay Holmes. [HuffPost]

* ‘OK not to be OK’: Mental health takes top role at Olympics (AP)

* Athlete support for Biles reflects growing awareness of mental health (Reuters)

* ‘A Peaceful Transfer of Power Didn’t Happen This Year’ -- The facts surrounding Jan. 6, 2021 - and the right-wing mythology. (NYT)

* Tuesday marked the first meeting of the House select committee charged with investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, with hours of emotional testimony about the mob of angry Donald Trump supporters that stormed the building and terrorized its occupants. Four law enforcement officers delivered intense and emotional testimony about the abuse they sustained that day and the trauma they still live with. [HuffPost]

* ‘Telling the Truth Shouldn’t Be Hard’: Officers Testify About Jan. 6 Riot -- Officers who defended the Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot testified to House lawmakers. The officers described in dramatic detail what they witnessed, and asked for a thorough investigation into what led to the attack. (NYT)

* As Jan. 6 hearings begin, Republicans side with the terrorists (WP)

* Republicans offer varying reasons for opposing Jan. 6 investigation -- Republicans’ struggle to explain their near-blanket opposition to having Congress examine the causes and ramifications of the insurrection has left the party open to charges that it is avoiding a thorough investigation of the worst attack on the Capitol since the War of 1812. (WP)

* After ducking the question multiple times, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) admitted on Fox News that he spoke to then-President Trump on Jan. 6, but he refused to disclose what they discussed. Jordan and other Republican allies to the former president could be potential witnesses to how Trump and his advisers were behaving during the attack. [HuffPost]

* U.S. Justice Dept. warns states to tread carefully in auditing elections (Reuters)

* As Infections Rise, C.D.C. Urges Some Vaccinated Americans to Wear Masks Again -- In communities with growing caseloads, vaccinated and unvaccinated people should return to wearing masks indoors in public areas, health officials said. (NYT)

* Google to require on-campus workers get vaccinated and delays return to the office until mid-October (WP)

* Biden Weighs Vaccine Mandate for Federal Workers -- It would be a significant shift in approach by President Biden that reflects the government’s growing concern about the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant. (NYT)

* The Pentagon Will Require Masks To Be Worn Indoors Even By Those Who Are Vaccinated (NPR)

* Pfizer data suggest third dose of Covid-19 vaccine 'strongly' boosts protection against Delta variant (CNN)

* The benefits of in-person learning still outweigh the risks (WP)

* I.M.F. Sticks With 6 Percent Global Growth Forecast -- The International Monetary Fund said it expected the global economy to expand 6 percent this year, but warned that low vaccination rates in emerging economies may lead to a lopsided global recovery. (AP)

*What extreme heat does to the human body -- How climate change is making parts of the world too hot and humid to survive. (WP)

* Washington’s Most Powerful Oil Lobby Faces Reckoning on Climate Change (WSJ)

* San Francisco is attempting to seize control over Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s power lines in the city by petitioning the California Public Utilities Commission to study the value of PG&E’s local electric equipment. (San Francisco Chronicle)

* Residents flee as winds fan massive wildfire in southern Turkey (Reuters)

* Get ready to pay more for tomatoes, as California growers reel from extreme weather (WP)

* Duolingo enters 'major leagues' with $6.5 billion valuation in strong debut (Reuters)

* Infrastructure deal: Senate ready to move ahead on $1T bill (AP)

* The Los Angeles Times reported on sexual assault allegations against Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer, his long history of internet-based controversy, and the potential end of his career. (LAT)

* U.S. 'deeply troubled' by attacks on civilians as Taliban sweep across Afghanistan (Reuters)

* CDC Director Alarmed After Googling ‘Covid Cases’ For First Time in Weeks (The Onion)

***

"Garden Party"

Ricky Nelson

Went to a garden party to reminisce with my old friends
A chance to share old memories and play our songs again
When I got to the garden party, they all knew my name
No one recognized me, I didn't look the same

But it's all right now, I learned my lesson well.
You see, ya can't please everyone, so ya got to please yourself

People came from miles around, everyone was there
Yoko brought her walrus, there was magic in the air
And over in the corner, much to my surprise
Mr. Hughes hid in Dylan's shoes wearing his disguise

But it's all right now, I learned my lesson well.
You see, ya can't please everyone, so ya got to please yourself

Played them all the old songs, thought that's why they came
No one heard the music, we didn't look the same
I said hello to "Mary Lou", she belongs to me
When I sang a song about a honky-tonk, it was time to leave

But it's all right now, I learned my lesson well.
You see, ya can't please everyone, so ya got to please yourself

Someone opened up a closet door and out stepped Johnny B. Goode
Playing guitar like a-ringin' a bell and lookin' like he should
If you gotta play at garden parties, I wish you a lotta luck
But if memories were all I sang, I rather drive a truck

And it's all right now, learned my lesson well
You see, ya can't please everyone, so you got to please yourself

-30-