It’s been a week of almost. Various things have gotten near to succeeding in some way but nothing has quite gotten over the edge. I’m used to that in life. It’s the way most things actually turn out. You shoot for a goal and you don’t quite make it. I don’t usually get discouraged. If I did, I’d never get anything done. I just regroup, take a slightly different aim and keep on plugging away. That seems to be where things are at not just on the personal but also the political field at the moment. One feels that we’re almost at the point where there’s going to be some accountability for the various tramplings of norms and laws that have become an everyday occurence but we never quite seem to reach the tipping point. I suppose it has something to do with the monetized media culture in which we bathe. There’s more money to be made in perpetual anticipation than there is in resolution.
The first ‘almost’ involves personal health. I took my Tuesday federal holiday and headed off to the outpatient surgery center at UAB West for my second set of injections into my cervical nerve roots on the left hoping that it would quell my shoulder girdle pain that came rip roaring back at the end of September. When I had it done last year, it was relatively easy – no anaesthesia, just lie still and a little local lidocaine. This time, fully out with the propofol and midazolam. I, of course, felt wrong for the next day or so while alll of that wore off. Did the procedue succeed? I’ll have to say almost. I think things are better, but I haven’t had the significant relief I did last year. I’ll give it a couple of weeks to see if the steroids kick in more over time. If not, on to plan B which will involve almost anything short of cervical spine surgery. I’ve seen far too many disasters with that over my career. Of course, two days later, while still a bit off, I tripped on a piece of rough sidewalk descending the 20th Street hill on Southside and skinned up my hands and knees. I’ll have to answer yes to the ‘Have you fallen in the last three months?’ question at my next checkup. Peepaw gonna have to remember. Ground Hard! Fall Bad! and start taking his walking stick…
The next almost is my attempt to fully come off book for Soul Food: Another Serving before this weekend’s rehearsals. I have my lines down – mainly – but they aren’t exactly where I want them yet. I’ve got three tech dresses before opening to be sure they’re all in place. I have my various tricks for learning and remembering them and I’m employing them all for this project as the rehearsal period has been short. I hope my castmates all give me some grace and remember that I am multiple decades older than most of them. As it’s starting to come together, it looks like the end result is going to be fun. I have a couple of really good scenes which should get me some significant laughs if I play them right. Plays next Thursday through Saturday at The Carver Theatre in town – presented by Encore Theatre and Gallery and tickets available at http://encorebham.org
The next almost are my attempts to get fully caught up at work prior to the holidays so I can actually spend some of those extra days off doing plenty of nothing rather than playing catch up. The routine work load is pretty much taken care of. I’ve got two legal cases that I have to complete, each with many thousands of pages of records that I have to finish reviewing and I just haven’t been able to fully gird up my loins on those yet. I have promised myself they will be done by the end of the month. We’ll see if I can keep that particular promise.
Then there are the almosts on the national stage. The headlines remain as absolutely nutty as they have since late January when the new administration assumed power. I really should be writing some new Mrs. Norman Maine columns but I’m finding it impossible to write her at the moment. No matter how crazy an idea I dream up for her next adventure, something even wackier hits the news the next day. Same reason why I can’t really do anything with Politically Incorrect Cabaret – how can you satirize the political moment in which we find ourselves? If I’d started writing a version a few months ago in which the president took a wrecking ball to the White House, the Republican party campaigned proudly on withholding food aid and healthcare, and Margery Taylor Green became a voice of reason, people would have told me I was going too far.
Where are the current almosts taking us? We’re about to attack Venezuela over something called ‘narcoterrorism’ that doesn’t actually exist. The real reason is likely that Venezuela’s oil reserves are bigger than Saudi Arabia’s and the oil and gas industry is salivating over getting their hands on them without the bother of negotiating with a sovereign foreign power. We have a long history of such moves in this country. See Hawaii. In the meantime, ‘extrajudicial killings’ continue which is just a fancy term for murder. As we the people don’t seem to be doing much to try and stop things, we’re all complicit and that doesn’t sit well with me. We continue to abuse and degrade immigrants, independent of their legal status and who cares if American citizens get caught up in the fray. Christian clergy dare to protest in the name of the gospel message of welcoming the stranger? Tackle and tear gas them and cheers from the MAGA crowd. Various Trump associates are inserting vacuum hoses into the treasury and sucking out millions in payments for themselves and their friends in contracts and legal recompense to which they feel entitled, all while the DOJ eggs it on and chases after Trump’s perceived enemies at his behest.
Like the rest of the world, I’m still waiting for the rest of the Epstein files to drop. Given what has appeared so far, it seems like there are all sort of sordid details yet to emerge and we’ll all be satisfying our prurient interests for some months to come. I just have to keep reminding myself that the girls involved were real people and that they were girls, without fully developed brains and they were being used and manipulted by fully grown adults who felt above the rules of society. I can’t give it a pass under ‘boys will be boys’. And the elements of MAGA who are trying to do so should be fully ashamed. But then MAGA and shame don’t ever seem to travel together.
Life, The Universe, and Everything 