Large Predators and Angry Humans in Everyday Ramblings

Once again in attempt to capture the white of the rhododendrons that surround my living area I got creative and went out just after dawn yesterday to a bush that must have been bought from the same nursery but planted a few blocks away in another orientation when it comes to the light. This is a shot from my phone, it would be less blurry if I had the camera but I was also out walking trying to snag my daily step quota early so I could rest later in the day.

Apparently I wasn’t kidding when I said I was tired enough from the allergens and work stress and the lack of a decent vacation to sleep for a few days because last night I curled up in bed early, way before it got dark.

Most Honorable had dropped me off at home (and played with the cats) after we went out to our favorite (and oddly deserted) Mexican restaurant for an early dinner. I had two margaritas with my meal and they and the food were yummy.

I slept 11 hours!

Who does that these days that is not either ill, depressed or under 19? (I did have a roommate in San Francisco who worked for the airlines and used to fly home for the weekend standby and then come back and sleep about 12 hours straight, but I haven’t been anywhere recently and don’t have that excuse.

I blame Climate Change and The Evil Empire.

There are so many unhappy people out there in the world. I find it sad.

And apparently exhausting.

Biologically we are wired to move away as fast as possible from large predators and angry humans. This morning I went out to get some diet soda at the local convenience store and there was a guy in there who looked like he had been up all night on a bender and as I came out he had just walked towards his car and a woman who I had not noticed on my way in, thin and wound up very tight lurched in my direction screaming at the top of her lungs angrily that “He thought I was a prostitute!!!”

I kind of stepped around her as she started moving parallel with me, jaywalking across the empty street and said as calmly as I could carefully trying to keep an edge out of my voice “Excuse me”, a phrase that has been corrupted by sarcasm in popular culture so much that I don’t normally use it but I was seriously rattled as I thought she might go for me or the small purse I had on it’s cord across my body.

I purposely walked away in a direction not towards the beautiful white rhododendrons surrounding my apartment and she went off the other direction indignantly continuing to yell.

I was two blocks away when it occurred to me that she had most likely lurched towards me in solidarity as a woman who might understand said indignity and in her addled world view hadn’t realized that expressing clearly pent up anger so forcefully at me might not engender solidarity at all, but instead an impulse to get away a.s.a.p.

The guy did strike me as a sleazy creep as well. Not that this spiritually attuned Buddhist Unitarian Yogi makes value judgments or anything. :)

Homelessness and drug addiction as well as mental illness are the biggest problem this city faces. We are growing absurdly fast and we are not handling it very well. This problem is visible everywhere one goes now in the city, there are tents and trash and drama everywhere.

I know that one of the first things I will do when I retire, if I manage to stay healthy enough to get there, is get involved in community action that helps address some of these incredibly difficult issues.

Suffering affects us all.

Last updated April 17, 2016