Crystal Aunts and the Crying Lorax (Dispatches from the Underground)
Sometimes you can figure out the good old days while you’re still living them
Welcome to the new half of the year! The change has come and we are in it now. Look around — you can tell even if you haven’t quite noticed.
The wave has broken, you can see it in the shadows just a little bit. You can sense it, if you pay attention, in the flagging mood of the dragonflies. And the fireflies, too. They’re maybe just a little less enthusiastic, more out of a kind of natural seasonal lethargy (laziness?) rather than the approach of death — although that’s still in store, for them and us, as well.
God do I love this time of year, that feeling like we’ve made it, that little pinch of maturity to both the year and our spirits, the moment when we no longer have to wonder what this year is gonna be all about but still have enough light left to celebrate and soak it up for months to come.
It’s a hopeful and refreshing time, whatever else might be going on.
I took a week off for the Fourth of July; actually, I really didn’t mean to, but I also impulsively decided it would be a good time to quit smoking cigarettes, which made it temporarily impossible for me to write. I’m back at it, though, and still no cigarettes, so. In lieu of congratulations, send money.
Kidding. Sort of. Someone should pay me for this.
But if you’ll remember waaaay back to last time, I think I mentioned how I was tired of writing about astrology all the time — specifically, I was tired of devoting space in every single Dispatches column to explaining how I’m dealing with the bad space weather. I’m still sick of it. Space weather aside, the real weather’s been fantastic. After a shitty, nonexistent spring, it’s sunny and in the 80s every day. There’s been some rain, but it’s largely been fleeting. The mood of life, despite any mitigating factors, has largely kept pace, and it’s been wonderful.
Speaking of things that are happening now, let’s do a little review:
- Mind-blowing anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion, after six months of hype, becomes available on Netflix. I watched it all immediately and it’s way better than I remember it.
- Marianne Williamson, some sort of Oprah-affiliated good vibes guru (some liken her, not inaccurately, to a “Crystal Aunt”) appears out of nowhere in the Democratic presidential debates. She wants to start a cabinet-level Department of Peace and also tell New Zealand in no uncertain terms that the US is a better place to raise a kid. All with love, of course.
- Someone starts a meme page on Facebook called “Marianne Williamson quotes over pictures of Neon Genesis Evangelion”, which is exactly what it sounds like.
- Marianne Williamson discovers this page and shares the memes from her campaign page.
- The Facebook page creates a meme featuring Marianne’s words about the meme page.
- Newsweek writes an article about Marianne Williamson sharing a meme of a Marianne Williamson quote on a Neon Genesis Evangelion picture.
- Marianne shares Newsweek article.
- There is also a nice AV Club article on this phenomenon.
This is 2019, my friends, and I gotta say, I am loving this! As a radical socialist, I normally hate election season — as I am duly supposed to — but honestly, this is too much fun and I just don’t care enough anymore to be pissed off all the time. To be perfectly honest, I got into this Marianne shit to be ironic and then over the last couple weeks I’ve started shrugging my shoulders. It’s becoming post-ironic, like my mustache. Seriously, guys, why not Williamson? I’m not supposed to support anyone in these bourgeois primaries, but I mean…yeah, I mean, fuck it. I’m supporting the Crystal Aunt. She’s out there, but I like what she says. And I’m a wizard, too — shouldn’t I get behind a candidate who talks about vibes and being an alien consciousness and departments of peace? Doesn’t Marianne deserve, by default, The Wizard Vote? Think about it — when the hell is there ever even a candidate suitable for this constituency?
We’re going to follow this path wherever it leads, right on through to the end because why not guys, why not. It’s 2019. This is where we are.
I’m really trying to make time this summer to read more fiction — and, more specifically, more fantastical fiction. So far, we’re a month into summer and this is just an idea, but at least my intentions are good.
This was underscored last weekend when me and the boys did our semi-annual viewing of the animated Hobbit film; my youngest and I have been listening to the soundtrack each morning since the end of June. It’s seasonal. The drive is very much with me and present. I just need to take action — and I know I’ll be better off for it.
I got to go up on the mountain, finally. It was a glorious nine-hour, ten-mile jaunt with five brilliant souls, and though it was unquestionably far too late in the year to be making my first climb, it was everything I had dreamed of.
This was back on the 29th; afterward, I had the fortune of going to a good friend’s to grill massive amounts of animal carcasses and watch that night’s Dead and Company show. Bobby burst into tears singing “Standing on the Moon”, which was deeply moving.
Standing on the moon
With nothing else to do
A lovely view of heaven
But I’d rather be with youStanding on the moon
I see a shadow on the sun
Standing on the moon
The stars go fading one by one
I hear a cry of victory
And another of defeat
A scrap of age old lullaby
Down some forgotten streetStanding on the moon
Where talk is cheap and vision true
Standing on the moon
But I would rather be with you
Somewhere in San Francisco
On a back porch in July
Just looking up to heaven
At this crescent in the sky(Words by Robert Hunter OF COURSE)
The message is really unique. I take it as a pretty bold rejection of enlightenment; the singer has the option to be above it all and within reach of heaven, but would rather feel the pain and the joy and the love and the connection inherent to being a human on Earth.
So would I.
Here it is, actually:
That night, I was pretty glad to be a human on earth. I love my friends and I love summer. That day, in total, was about as perfect as a summer day can be.
Sometimes you can definitely see the good old days as you are living them. It happens to me all the time now.