Like many my age, I rarely sleep through the entire night. Finding myself wide awake at 3 a.m., I might grab my phone and knock off the daily Wordle and Spelling Bee on the New York Times website. The other night, however, I made the mistake of first perusing the headlines. They were hardly the perfect antidote for sleeplessness.
Headline No. 1 told how the tech geniuses who are working with AI are now concerned that it’s not only developed an unrestrained mind of its own, but could possibly exterminate the human race in the near future. Or maybe not.
Not to be outdone, I then read a review of a new book by Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor titled “End Times Fascism,” which details how “Christian” extremists, tech billionaires and MAGA-like populist movements are conspiring to destroy our democracy and drag us back to the Middle Ages. Or maybe not.
The last entry was more immediate. With all access points to Middle East oil being strangled thanks to Donald Trump’s unbelievably stupid war with Iran (which he seems to have lost interest in; the Iranians and Houthis have not), there’s a good chance of the global economy coming to a crashing halt. Or maybe not.
It was quite hard going back to sleep after that jolly trio of apocalyptic forecasts.
But you’ll notice the repetitive phrase at the end of each of these dismal predictions. Or maybe not. It’s far from an attempt to be clever, but to acknowledge that we are living in one of the more unsettling times most of us have ever encountered. It’s as if we’ve all fallen off a cliff and don’t know whether a safety net or jagged rocks await our tumbling bodies. There are days when I refuse to access the news, not wanting to know what latest lunacy has befallen my nation, if not the world at large.
Supposedly, I’m a “pundit,” that class of smug, opinionated writers who can safely make sense of all the chaotic threads of current events. I will be the first to admit that I cannot. I might have some positive concepts that venture into the realm of spirituality, but they are balanced by my Jewish genetics that warn how quickly one can be transported from normal to horrific. From the cozy living room to the boxcar bound for Auschwitz. I’m quite certain that Hispanic and Haitian immigrants living under Trump’s cruel and racist reign of terror can relate.
But the schizophrenic whiplash tugging at us Americans continues to make my head spin. Last January, when the poison of Trumpism appeared to be overwhelming all that was good and decent, out of nowhere came those 19 Vietnamese Buddhist monks marching through the deepest of the deep red South and being showered with love, gratitude, prayers and affection. It was more than just the cute little dog that accompanied them. We were all thirsting for something hopeful and inspiring. And then they were gone, and it was as though we were thrown back into the abyss.
Last month, Dolly Parton died and reminded us of these positive values that I had thought had been lost. I was never a Dolly “fan” and knew little about her but found myself deeply affected by her passing. Here was one of the more famous cultural icons who practiced kindness, humility and, most important, generosity. As many have noticed, she didn’t use her wealth to send billionaires into space or to buy politicians. She used it to educate children, aid medical research and support families who lost their homes to natural disasters, among her other charitable acts. The overwhelming outpouring of love for her shows that deep down, Americans of whatever political stripe respect the principles she epitomized.
But now she is gone and we are back looking in the mirror, which is apt. It’s a temptation to let others reflect back to us the work we should be doing on our own. No outside force will come to save us unless humanity first strives to achieve the better angels of its nature.
Long ago, some unknown higher power decided the dinosaurs that ruled Earth were a mistake. Along came the famous Chicxulub asteroid that effectively wiped them out along with 75% of Earth’s species. There are times when I fear that the same higher power might be wondering the same about us. Just another evolutionary error; only in our case, we might self-destruct.
Or maybe not.
Daniel A. Brown lived in Franklin County for 44 years and has written a monthly My Turn column for over two decades. He lives outside of Santa Fe, New Mexico, with his wife, Lisa and dog, Cody.