We got up early, as we like to do on Sunday mornings, we went outside with the dogs to feed the animals and put Chloe in her barn. I like to let Maria sleep late, but today we both went out together, I had the itch to write something about the elections that are upsetting so many people, and I’ll do that next.
It is very sweet to go outside as the sun comes up, the animals are all hungry and focused on us, the dogs excited and eager to get to work, the mists rising off the hills around us. The farm has changed me, I am not the same person I was before I bought and farm and came to live on one.
Somehow, the farm has been a teacher to me, has taught me perspective, patience, detachment. Today, our friend Eve Marko is coming up for a visit, we are meeting for lunch at the Round House, I am eager to do some writing here, we are thinking of going to a movie tonight.
Friday, a woman who lives in town and seems overwhelmed by my minor celebrity, saw me on the street and began shouting at me, that I was the famous Jon Katz, that she my hat looked like a pumpkin, and I imagine she was either drinking too much or disturbed in some way.
She kept shouting at me as I went to pick up some food to take home and I think she thought she was being funny, I’m not sure. She was loud, and obnoxious, and relentless.
I never feel this in my town, I am not famous, and no one ever treats me as a celebrity. I suppose that was the violation, that the old memories I have of being screamed at too often. A trauma of its own kind. Sometimes, people scream at me online, they use a lot of capital letters and exclamation points because they are not sure how to speak normally.
It is a background noise of our time, and just look at the political campaigns, news coverage and commentary, a violent exercise.
I understood, in this small way, the feeling of being violated, it almost felt like a molestation, and I suppose it was. I am feeling it still, and am not sure why I can’t just dismiss it. I will sit down a bit and let go of it, it is part of life.