Home and Away

College recruiting, corporate management and consulting carried me across much of the United States. Although some of that travel prompted future visits, a suitcase in one hand, briefcase in the other wasn’t the most satisfying way to explore cities and countryside. There are cities I enjoy, mountains worth the travel, lovely ocean sides. Driving across the plains or open lands remind me how different our life experiences are from fellow citizens.

The Midwest continues to be where I am comfortable living my life. Green spaces, cities, the Great Lakes, agriculture, forests blend well. We considered moving during our careers, imagining our lives in desert lands or other river cities, even one Canadian possibility. Except for Canada, I don’t regret passing up those changes.

Something moved me in the childhood lands of Pat Conroy and Flannery O’Connor. The charm of old Savannah and the Lowcountry areas of Georgia and South Carolina felt homey. I wanted to stay for a year, maybe two, and learn about the rhythm of that region’s residents. To walk where azaleas and trees blossomed in March, to witness the loggerhead turtle’s journey, to try Sunday church once more, to celebrate holidays differently.  Biscuits tasted better, seafood fresher, crayfish better than a slab of whitefish. 

Weeks in Maine challenged my Midwest assumptions that farms were farms, days on the shore universal, that New England was an area of wealth and education. Spending weeks in a London flat introduced reality to daydreams of living in a congested metropolitan area. Nearly two weeks in a small Irish community felt nice, but I wanted to go home. This stretch of the south felt like it could be home as if the slower movement of my mature life would be acceptable in a place that has nurtured so many artistic folks.

When the roof needs repair, spring returns to stormy winter, property taxes increase, daydreams happen about a mythical life in a charming setting where all seems lovely. But roofs deteriorate there, summer temps and humidity can be high, history and today’s politics lean away from my values. Best to keep Savannah on my writing retreat list and my home in the Midwest. I’ll be back with a notebook, laptop, and good walking shoes during azalea season.

Information Blast Zone

A group of creative writers gathered for our annual retreat this weekend. A few of us had been local government news reporters and all of us are voracious followers of news media. For a second year, we admitted to not watching much national coverage or reading news that could be interesting. We frequently skipped the big stories which seemed redundant yet not very thorough. Like almost two-thirds of Americans, we are all tired of news.

News sometimes appeared to be repurposed to be featured many times. You might read it in an online tonight, see in in print the next day, see the same copy in a second online newspaper a day later then featured on an electric media show. How old is the information? How important? How close to the information’s original offering is the rejiggered version. Hard to know.

The 2023 Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found that Americans’ fatigue with news continues to climb. The Pew Research 2020 study reported that two-thirds of us feel that fatigue. Here’s Reuters current facts:

• More than one in ten Americans report turning news off. 
• 41% of women and 34% of men say that they sometimes, or often, avoid news. 
• While the study is global, American specific data also show specific areas of fatigue including about one-third of participants staying away from news of the war in Ukraine, forty percent avoiding national politics and an equal percentage not watching coverage of social justice.

There isn’t a lot of information offered about why the numbers are dropping except that news followers are staying within their chosen silos and going to news that is more comfort than challenging. If a viewer doesn’t like the Trump story, watch international news. If it is climate change coverage that is overwhelming, maybe the stock market is more interesting. And when all the breaking news color bands feel like a repeat of yesterday, maybe home remodeling shows or sports coverage or reality television provide a break. 

Folks who study how Americans absorb news point to the 1980 CNN effect–broadcasting news twenty-four hour a day, seven days a week. If you hear a story once, you’re going to hear it possibly every hour, maybe half hour. The 2022 Berkley Economic Review called the CNN model a market failure intensifying conspicuous bias that results in inefficient coverage of other news. Policy makers and decision makers are impacted by the continuous messages.

Jon Stewart’s observation may be the best. His opinion is that the 24/7 news cycle elevates the stakes of every moment putting the public in the “information blast zone.”  And there we get tired.

Basics of Love

The basics of love can be as simple as the thrill of sparkling diamond fireworks appearing seconds after the burst of red and blue or hearing a particularly well-arranged version of a favorite song.

The word may be more loosely than the emotions. We love a football team, a blue car, our neighbor’s tabby cat, the smooth sauce on a half rack of ribs. There are friends we love. Relatives we love. Family we love. The one most desire, a someone to love. 

Loving is a gift of humanity as well as a trigger into dissatisfaction, loneliness, despair. Sometimes the search for a place where love can be shared is difficult and it isn’t always successful. It is helpful to identify that when it emanates from another human.

“Hello in There,” a song by John Prine is the story of an older man who lives in a city with his wife. Their only son was killed in a war. Most days they sit around and watch the world. He encourages people to look at older folks passing by, remember how lonely they might be, and try saying hello. If possible, spread a thin little layer of love to someone in need, even an acknowledging smile to the person next in line. Maybe you prefer to think of that tiny effort as paying it forward. Doesn’t matter. May the love come back to you as well.

On the Day after International Women’s Day—Recent Immigrants’ Thoughts about Gender Inequality

Yesterday, the adult immigrants I tutor were discussing an article about pay inequality and education disparities in some countries. The article stated, “In the US, women can expect to earn about 80% of their male counterparts’ salaries.” After a quick online search, I found the specifics in a Government Accountability Office report. In 2021, women working full-time had an estimated median pay that ranged from $0.69 to $0.85 for every dollar earned by men. The pay range depended on what sector women worked in.

Other countries have different cultural dynamics and economic opportunities, so the students offered a variety of views. I silently noted the range of perspectives could also be found among people born in the U.S. Here’s a cross-section of what the students said:

“In my home country, women get paid less than men, but I didn’t think that happened in the U.S. Are you sure?”

“Men need to make more money since they’re supporting a family, and the women take care of the children and the house.”

“School isn’t free in my home country. My parents had a big family and couldn’t pay school fees for all of them. So they paid for the boys’ schooling, since they’ll have to support a family.”

“I know pay differences between men and women happened in the past. You’re telling me it’s still going on?”

“In my culture, mothers and daughters are supposed to cook, clean, and take care of children. Fathers and sons don’t. They earn the money.”

“My mother wasn’t educated because her family didn’t have the money. My grandfather thought she didn’t need an education since she’d marry and have a husband taking care of her. But my father became disabled, and it was hard for my mother to support eight kids.”

“International Women’s Day? What—we only get one day?”

Long Time Coming

A pretty, first snow fell in the Twin Cities on October 14, then disappeared providing weeks to prepare for the next season. Winter this year has been an unreliable roommate making Monday commutes miserable then offering a day or two of mild temps. A stingy relative refusing to share sunshine unless temps freeze cheeks. A mean neighbor dumping snow, ice, rain, sleet, snow and more snow making skating rink maintenance or sidewalk cleaning just miserable. 

Minnesota has not received the enormous snow dumps of Buffalo or the California mountains, but if you bought new boots this year you made a good decision. If you remembered dressing following extreme cold guidelines and prepared for the bus stop or parking lot hike looking like a Squishmallow with legs, bravo. Some of us gave up on attractive sleepwear to pull on flannels, hoodies and socks after dinner then stayed in the same as long as possible in the morning. Hard-core Minnesotans supposedly wear long undies twenty-four seven from November through March except when they escape for their winter getaway.

Beyond puzzle construction time, optimal sleep conditions may be winter’s attraction. No sun peeking around the window coverings when you go to bed, nothing sticking to your warm body, no birds at five in the morning.

Whatever the statistics are for this year, it has been a long time coming since we could wander outside consistently without a hat or gloves or boots. Oh, the joy of leaving the puffer coat unzipped and wearing old shoes when running errands. The amazing experience to eat dinner while natural light brightens the kids’ faces. There will be more snow, but it will be short lived. We’re heading into t-shirt, jeans and a light cover season. We are going to eat outside before the mosquitos multiply. 

Meantime, stay upright and don’t drop into a road crater. We have about as much control over shortening winter’s existence as our governments appear to have over rebuilding critical infrastructure. That will be a really long, long time coming.