{"id":24891,"date":"2016-03-01T12:03:19","date_gmt":"2016-03-01T20:03:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/ClaireWolfe\/?p=24891"},"modified":"2016-03-01T12:03:19","modified_gmt":"2016-03-01T20:03:19","slug":"the-things-you-notice-when-youre-living-real-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/2016\/03\/01\/the-things-you-notice-when-youre-living-real-life\/","title":{"rendered":"The things you notice when you’re living real life"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s been busy — but mundane — in the 10 days since I suspended home Internet. Mundane is good. I like mundane. In fact, the virtues of downright boredom are sadly unappreciated in this busy-busy day.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I’ve had excitement in my life. Looking back, most of it was too darned exciting and not at all pleasant. I did not relish the moment the jetliner I was in had to pull up unexpectedly because some other plane full of people decided to cross in front of it (nor the time the plane I was in nearly landed on the roof at Shannon Airport after coming down all kerflotchy in a storm). Even aside from Incidents Involving Airplanes, very little in my life that I think of as “exciting” was anything I’d care to repeat. Bad LSD trips. Cars plunging off (fortunately small) banks into (fortunately small) trees. Earthquakes. Hurricane-force winds. Eating raw oysters. Being threatened by a crazed stalker. Meeting Charles Manson.<\/p>\n

Nope. You can keep your “exciting.” I’m loving mundane. <\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

Having limited ‘Net (and having the abundance of Real Life that goes along with all that extra time) also changes perspective.<\/p>\n

The day Comcast shut off service was the Saturday of the Nevada D-Party caucuses and I was in an agony of suspense, hoping terrible electoral things would happen to Hillary Clinton. Today … I didn’t realize it was Super Tuesday until I came to the library and did a brief news cruise. And when I found out I didn’t care.<\/p>\n

The notion that we can somehow “v*te ourselves into” freedom or happiness or justice or democracy or prosperity or whatever seems more and more bizarre the further I get away from the process.<\/p>\n

Elections themselves — especially this year — are such a wildly entertaining (dare I say “exciting”?) show that it’s easy to forget how foolish the whole business is. Yet there it is: millions of people actually believe they’re going to v*te for somebody-or-another who’s going to “make America great again” or “make healthcare affordable” or whatever. But just quit watching the business for a week or two and its absurdity — it’s insanity<\/i> — is thrown into high relief.<\/p>\n

Political wonk and chronic gov-guy Larry Summers wails that Donald Trump is a serious threat to democracy<\/a> — that The Donald is what happens when people get fed up and desperate. What Larry Summers fails to see is that he himself, and others of his exalted government class, are the thing inspiring such crazed desperation<\/i>. <\/p>\n

Sure, Donald Trump’s a potential disaster. But only because of all the political disasters that have come before — many of them created by Summers’ own favs.<\/p>\n

And to think the first thing I did upon reaching legal age was to rush out — oh so proudly! — and register to v*te. Hard to believe I was so deluded once upon a time. But what can I say? I blame government schooling and my dear old socialist mother. <\/p>\n

I didn’t agree with an iota of her politics, but she sure had me totally sucked into that v*ting thing. And that “politics as theater” business. Now, as I clean house and do illustrations and watch out the windows and spread drywall mud and play with the dogs and don’t<\/i> immerse myself even in the shallow un-reality show that is election news, mundane life looks more sane while the sham of “public” life doesn’t even look entertaining.<\/p>\n

Yeah. Put politics right up there with near-miss plane crashes when it comes to “excitement” I don’t need.<\/p>\n

Now. If only the damn political craft wasn’t going to go ahead and crash upon us all …<\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

NOTE: I have another long post queued up for tomorrow. As a general rule, I’m going to try to post Tuesdays and Fridays during this ‘Netly hiatus. Sometimes I’ll have bonuses like tomorrow’s. Can’t actually promise a regular schedule, but Tuesday and Friday is what I’ll aim for unless something major strikes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s been busy — but mundane — in the 10 days since I suspended home Internet. Mundane is good. I like mundane. In fact, the virtues of downright boredom are sadly unappreciated in this busy-busy day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mind-and-spirit","category-poly-ticks","ratio-natural","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24891\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}