Sarge is a tough old Army Truck from the Vietnam War, he lives on Pompanuck Farm, he belongs to my friend Scott Carrino. He comes her once a year, when it’s time to dispose of our pungent but valuable donkey manure pile.
We give a lot of it to our friends, we use it in our own gardens – it is amazing – and Scott takes a truckload for the Pompanuck Farm gardens. There is no charge.
We let Scott know when Vince is coming to work on the gravel with his tractor, and Scott or his helper Wally drive it out to the farm and leave it near the pile.
When Vince is done leveling the Pole Barn, he drops most of the manure into Sarge, and then Scott comes and picks it up. It goes into the very beautiful Pompanuck Gardens.
We’re thinking of selling bags of our manure ($10) at the Open House, both as a souvenir and something useful for gardeners. We sell the mature manure, it’s the stuff close to the grown, powdery and easy to spread. Something new.
Right about now, Bud is in his huge truck with about 100 other dogs heading out of the South and into the Northeast, where all of these dogs will be picked up by their new owners at pre-arranged stops along the way.
Bud should be arriving in Brattleboro, Vt., 90 minutes from our farm, sometime in the morning. His medical papers and some medications for Giardia will be on the truck with him.
We have a crate for him to ride in, or he might spend sometime in somebody’s lap, if he is so inclined. Carol says he’s fairly big for a Boston Terrier, so I might go out today and pick up a couple of medium-sized dog beds.
Otherwise, we are all set, and we are both looking forward to meeting him and helping him feel safe and comfortable. He has the bearing of a Grand Vizier, the regal look that some dogs have.
Carol John says he is sweet, playful and can be charming when treats are involved.
I imagine he will be bewildered after being mistreated and abandoned, and then so sick, then three months in Carol’s home, then two days on a truck. This guy needs some stability. I’m thinking he will be happy here.
He is not allowed on any sofa. (Remember that?) Therapy dog training starts on Monday.
Okay, so we all can see now that we live in a Broken Nation. I believe a great leader is coming to us to help us heal.
The leaders we now have in place seem to only be able to divide, not unify. They come from another time and place, they seem bewildered and confused.
They accept rage and cruelty. Wherever they can, they pit one of us against the other. And we let them.
So people of faith and people of good faith watch the news in anguish and sorrow and look for hope amid despair.
Yesterday, the awful spectacle of two human beings, both in anguish and torment and tears, and half of us beat up on one, and the rest of us beat up on the other. We are like the crowd in the great Coliseum, sitting behind our screens while the lions tear people to pieces.
Government of the people is not supposed to be about hurting and frightening and ignoring the people, we have lost our way.
So we live in a Broken Land, see what the labels have done to us, and to our ability to think and listen and feel for ourselves. Where did my country, and why was I asleep when it left?
I ended the day angry and discouraged, and then determined to get to a better place. If I can’t rind peace and compassion outside of myself, I can find it inside of me, where my own news lives. And I did.
I find it with the Army Of Good, I find it in doing deeds of good.
Somehow, we have lost our way, this birthplace of democracy, and the individual challenge is how to find our own unity until our new Messiah arrives or we wear ourselves out hating one another. I am full of hope.
The women I know are as engaged as I have ever seen them, and their revolution moves forward, plenty of bumps in the road, but no dearth of energy or passion. I do not believe they will ever be bludgeoned into silence again. Perhaps that makes me naive, but I am not naive, I feel hopeful.
Away from the circuses of the left and right, i see important things happening everywhere.
I think people who discard the power and message of women will be regretting it, and soon. I believe things are change. I believe it is time.
That is the source of great hope for me. A commentator on cable news said last night that the ending is always the same in Washington “the woman lose.” I’m not so sure, there is a new narrative coming like a big strong wave.
I trust in the God Of Life, I am called to live out of a new place, beyond the emotions and arguments and passions of the moment. I seek a world without jealousy, anger, resentment and rage, they are the children of resentment and abandonment.
I trust that there is another and better place, my angels and spiritual guides each took an arm and lead me to safety and peace of mind.
They took me inside, not outside, to the core of my being, my heart, where all of my feelings and emotions and love and anger converge in my own personal truth, not anyone else’s.
Every time I do good, my core is stronger and more unified. Odd, but it works.
I don’t need the left or the right to tell me how to feel, do we still think they know one thing more than we do?
I call this core my place of unification, my unity. If I can’t find it outside I know it lives inside. My deeper self dwells there, separate from my emotions and the needs of my body.
There, if I close my eyes and open my heart, I am called to unity, the shining place of the soul. I step past the emotions of the day and into my own place of unification. It is a wonderful place to visit.
It is so much better to do good than to argue about what good is.
So I’m changing for good, and wanted to give you good people an update, since these changes affect many of you as well as me.
I’m shifting the focus of my good deeds.
My good friend Ali is being pursued by sponsors for the soccer team who have a lot more money than I have, and live a lot closer. And good for him.
As it happens, this meshes well with some changes I have been hoping to make in my own world of good works.
The soccer team is very expensive to sponsor, and I had to fund raise more than I am comfortable with, for my good and also for the good of people who are sending me money. I don’t mind asking for financial support, but I don’t wish to have to do it every day. I had the feeling I was having to do it too often for my comfort level.
Ali wants the team to live to the fullest, he has the right to his dream. The soccer team is comprised of some of the most wonderful people, I will always be on hand to help them if they need help. I have come to love these kids.
The Army Of Good is not rich, and neither am I.
I want to be thoughtful and careful. I was to stay small, and be transparent and cautious. We don’t do miracles, we perform small acts of great kindness.
Every other day, I get envelopes with $5 and $10 from good people with big hearts all over the country. Those crinkled and faded bills remind me every day to respect these people and be mindful of them.
As the members of the Army Of Good know, I want to keep these enterprise small and manageable. Small acts of great kindness. The soccer team needs a year-long and deep-pocketed sponsor, Ali has made the team into something powerful and wonderful and it deserves every penny it can get.
This year we did two big things: we purchased a van, went on a dozen outings, and are also helping to send Sakler Moo to an expensive private school as well as outfitting a large, hungry and dedicated team.
I have no wish to stand in their way, Ali has done the most outstanding work, and I am grateful for the experience of working with him and being his friend.
I think we helped get the soccer team to a great place, and I thank Ali and all of you for your support. Time to get out of the way.
I certainly intend to keep on doing some refugee and immigrant work, it is important to me.
I am committed to getting Sakler Moo annual tuition assistance – between $5,000 and $6,000 a year – throughout his four-year term at the Albany Academy, and Monday I am meeting with officials there to see if we can’t get another one or two refugee kids into the school with full scholarships. I am hopeful.
That will take some time and work and money and I want to pursue it.
it’s the best way I can see to be meaningful and really change lives for these children.
I think that’s a good focus for me, and of course The Mansion will remain the other focus, I feel closer than ever to that amazing place and want very much to continue supporting the staff in their work and the residents in their lives.
I will never turn my back on the Mansion.
We have done a lot of good in the past year, I want to do even more, but in a more focused (and less expensive) way. I don’t wish to be a full-time fund-raiser, but I will continue to see money for the focused causes I have mentioned.
So in that vein, if you wish to contribute to this good work, you can send a donation to Jon Katz, P. O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, or via Paypal, [email protected]. Small contributions are welcome (big ones also). Please mark the payments for “The Mansion.”
And thanks. This feels good, liberating and exciting.
I was thinking of the Nobel Laureate Isaac Singer today, I remember at the end of his memoir, Lost In America, written soon after he fled the Nazi’s and came to America, that he threw open the windows of his crowded new immigrant apartment and shouted to the world outside, “I am lost, lost in America.”
He was bewildered by his new country, and overwhelmed, and that’s why I thought of him today, for the first time in my life that I can remember, I felt overwhelmed and lost in America, the only country I have ever known.
I’m struggling to find my place here, sinking deeper into the good works we are doing her, and finding solace and comfort from it.
I could not bear to watch much of the day-long hearings in the Senate, the pain and hurt and rage was too much for me to bear, and I am not delicate or frail. I just couldn’t really stand to see what has happened to our country, a brave and wonderful new system of government that has survived for centuries, a noble if often ignoble experiment.
Today, I watched two herds of elephants crash into one another, hour after hour.
I have a rabidly conservative friend in Philadelphia and a progressive friend in San Francisco, and I asked them both to text me about the hearings from time to time, I wanted to see how each reacted.
At the end of the day, they each were thrilled, but for completely opposite reasons. My progressive friend was overjoyed by the testimony of Dr. Ford, my Trump-loving friend was equally uplifted by the angry and emotional performance of Judge Kavanaugh.
“This is a great day,” said my progressive friend, “Dr. Ford was brilliant, she has inspired women to stand up for themselves, this will bring real change.” My conservative friend was enthralled that the Judge had let the Democrats have it, and stood up for himself, just like the President does. “I loved it,” he said, “he really threw some truth at them.”
He was especially pleased by Senator Lindsey Graham’s outburst.
And so this is it in America, I often feel caught in the middle of these two disparate, angry and very different worlds, one never quite gets on top of the other, they simple battle and rage and fall over one cliff after another. Values matter less and less, only positions and outcomes.
I am learning that ideology is a poison, you can get sick just from watching it or breathing it. What a sad day.
Everyone believes they know the right thing, and cannot listen or change or even speak to the other side.
In the animal world, when animals fight, one invariably wins and drives off or kills the other. Struggles are resolved.
In the political world, no one ever wins and the battle never ends, it just gets bloodier and angrier. It feels like two armies that fight on and on, and one can never conquer the other. They fight for so long and so hard it simply becomes a way of life. This is the poison of the left and right, the two ideologies that each us to close our minds and never think.
I felt today that I was trapped between two giant melting ice bergs come together to to crush me in the middle. I felt unmoored, and unsure of my country. There is really no place for people like me to go that is neither shrinking or out of this awful loop. If you seek to think for yourself, you are an outcast, wandering on the edge.
I couldn’t find a thing to feel good about or to crow up in that dreary day of rage and manipulation and posturing. Nobody can win on a day like that, no one can even be unquestionably right. I can’t keep track of what right is.
I spent my day taking photos, driving to Saratoga to learn that my dental implant is failing, and must come out. And waiting for news of Bud on his truck heading North. That feels good. I will bring some new shoes to Jerry at the Mansion Friday morning, hers have big holes in them. That feels good too.
