World’s getting a touch weird, yes?
Strange people have been “elected” to power (in many nations). New but otherwise fairly ordinary diseases have caused radical fashion shifts. Already touch-deprived(1), now most of us can not touch each other at all, practically upon pain of Law. Some merchants no longer accept cash; some merchants take cash but can no longer make change, so you have to “round up.” The mints are not running, there’s no coinage happening(2). You have to wear a mask to get into a restaurant yet can sit there for hours without one. The toilet paper shortage (which is still going on in some places) apparently has only a little to do with the hoarding that happened around the “pandemic panic,” and apparently would have been happening anyway. Libraries, which are pretty critical services to a lot of people, have been closed since March (at least ’round these here parts, they have), which means for the last 6 months folks who depend on the library for internet, email, copies, faxes, movie “rentals” and even (oh my gosh!) the occasional book are out of luck. George Washington statues have been trampled all over America over an accusation only partially true. There’s a shortage of laptops on the market, apparently due to a “trade war” with China(3). Gold is at unprecedented value compared to the dollar, which means the dollar as at an unprecedented low in buying power. Hundreds of people are reporting having the same dream, and it’s not a comfortable one. Unemployment can’t even be measured accurately right now, because of the lock down. Banks are starting to act awfully squirrely. Your doctor will see you only by video now — how’s he going to palpate my abdomen or tell if my leg is broken or only sprained from across the internet? Children have been out of school just forever, and parents are actually having to supervise their children’s education — with the help of teachers and daily lessons over the internet.
Well… that last one’s not so bad — that actually might even be a serious improvement, parents being involved, I mean; not the internet so much. The rest of it?
Kind of strange and there’s a whole lot more just plain weird [or wyrd in the original] going on right now, too, some of it just a bit too “out there” for me to mention directly here(5), but I am aware of some of these — as you also might be — and it’s really all on the same list. Take all of it as a package, please.
This is a time that, 100 years from now, historians(6) will argue over, wonder over, debate, flunk their students over for having the “wrong opinions” about, etc. There will books written about this moment in history. You are living in an “interesting time.”
Here’s the question for you to ponder: what will the future historians call this time? Will it be the Great Pandemic of 2020? Will it be the Global Crackdown? Will be the Great TP Shortage? Or will it earn a far more ominous name based on facts and/or events yet to be realized?
Think it over. Wonder about that, but not too much.
Continue to live your life the best way you can, and remember that “global things” — even national things — rarely affect you, the individual. The new rules for face-masks are not nearly as immediate as the morning traffic jam (auto highway or information highway, either one). Who’s in the White House or the Kremlin or Zhongnanhai (China) isn’t nearly as immediate as how your kids’ did with today’s lessons or that next family fishing trip.
So… what I mean is: life is life, no matter how much your attention might be drawn to other matters by the adrenaline-pumping / anxiety-addicting media. Life is still life, and most of what the media reports does not affect you or me in any way at all (strange as that idea might seem to those who have never considered it before).
So… this is an interesting time, yes. And some folks are all caught up in that, and that may be just fine for them. But, for me and for a lot of the folks around me, it’s just another beautiful day here. I even have sufficient change in my cash drawer for all my customers’ transactions.
How weird is that?
(1) Touch deprivation is a serious disorder and surprisingly and unfortunately common even before the “social distancing” commandment came along. Lack of touch to the skin affects the brain, reduces cognition and appears to be a major contributor to various forms of senility as well as various emotional disorders. Touch is extremely important to the health of the body and nervous system. Not my opinion only; it’s in studies all over the place. Find the studies online.
(2) That’s the stated reason for the inability to make change; what I want to know though is what happened, then, to the coins that were in circulation? Did they wear out and fade away?
(3) Yes, America invented the things. No, America doesn’t actually manufacture them anymore. When you manufacture almost nothing, consume everything and get all that stuff from just one other nation, does it really make sense to offend that other nation?
(4) But what about those families who do not have internet or computers? In America, internet is not free, is not even always high-speed. In fact, though America invented the internet [chiefly Dr Larry Roberts made the internet possible and he was awarded a certificate from the IEEE naming him in fact Father of the Internet — I saw the plaque myself], though we invented it, Americans on average pay the highest price for the poorest internet service of all the industrialized / “modern” nations. Meaning there’s a not insignificant portion of the American people who do not have access to the internet. Ironic and quite shameful both. Go figure…
(5) Believe it or not, I’m not a radical, not even leftist nor rightist. I’m not even sure I’m a centrist. I just look at things as I look at them at the moment. I’m even ready to revise my opinions anytime I get more data, too, which surely excludes me from any fixed location in the political spectrum.
(6) Yes, I am assuming there will be future historians. The rest of the article is pointless otherwise, so just go with it…