Everything is in flux

Luckily, the long-to-be remembered snow storm of October '11 was apparently deflected from Cape Cod and the Boston area by the relatively warm waters of the Atlantic. Now I sit looking at still green leaves tossing in what I know to be a very chilly wind but beneath a sky of slightly dirty looking cotton clouds with snippets of blue in between while 75 or so miles to west and north heavy deep snow has brought down limbs and turned off electricity and caused consternation and havoc. The second highly unusual storm in two months, counting hurricane Irene, for those parts of New England. Yes, the climate is in flux.

Reading the newspaper I find that the whole world is in flux, politically. Things seem rather quiet down in Australia and New Zealand and those Pacific island nations although it may just be that their quieter flux is ignored by the news because so much else is happening. Not only has the Occupy Wall Street movement spread to other US cities and to cities in Europe, but we've just seen the paroxysms of the "Arab spring". I read today that middle class Indians are shedding their usual political apathy and both demonstrating and voting to stop the endemic bureaucratic corruption. China is terrified by their own almost daily demonstrations which, with current media communications, could grow massively, so they are cracking down on both Internet and television. Things are always unsettled in various parts of Africa, Mexico is in the throes of serious drug wars, parts of South America are unsettled ... and so it goes ... everything in flux. A period of instability physically and politically.

I am a watcher, I've learned that knowing is a good thing, being aware is grounding, but worrying in a waste of time when I could be quietly finding the good and creative things I can do to be happy with my life and perhaps contribute a bit to the small world around me. An hour spent wringing my hands about global warming or the greed begotten by capitalism is an hour I cannot enjoy the limited hours that remain in my life -- which I hope are a great many but when you've hit the Big 7-0 you're an ostrich with her head in the sand if you don't give a little thought most days to the limits of life. But if you're reasonably balanced, you use the time as consciously as possible.