Midlife Meditation

Los Angeles protesters burn a Trump-shaped pinata. What do you do with the mad that you feel When you feel so mad you could bite? When the whole wide world seems oh, so wrong... And nothing you do seems very right? What do you do? Do you punch a bag? Do you pound some clay or some dough? Do you round up friends for a game of tag? Or see how fast you go? It's great to be able to stop When you've planned a thing that's wrong, And be able to do something else instead And think this song: I can stop when I want to Can stop when I wish. I can stop, stop, stop any time. And what a good feeling to feel like this And know that the feeling is really mine. Know that there's something deep inside That helps us become what we can. For a girl can be someday a woman And a boy can be someday a man. --Fred M. Rogers, 1968 I was at the gym, lifting weights, listening to Marc Maron's Wednesday morning rant about the horror of Tuesday night. Norma...

Aftermath of last night's riots in Portland. 9/11, meet 11/9. It's cropping up all over Facebook: the observation that reversing the calendar numbers of America's deadliest terrorist attack gives the date of Hillary Clinton's concession to Donald Trump, the greatest risk to American democracy since that attack. And I feel it, too, as I struggle to lose myself in chores, errands, tasks. For a few hours on Wednesday, teaching was the perfect drug, enabling me to check out of my base-level horror and just be utterly present for my students. Unfortunately, Thursday was a planning day--no student contact hours--and I spent most of it running recorders through my dishwasher, hardly an intellectually immersive task. Today is worse still: I've got nothing on my agenda that will keep me from thinking about what is happening all around me. It would help if I could cut myself off from the media, both social and journalistic, but I can't. Every time I pick up...