Some days the news is so depressing that I wonder whether I'd be better off closing the apps and ignoring it.

Not that there's anything particular about today's news. Budget fights, ugliness towards the Haitians, more proof that our system is failing us in all sorts of ways (healthcare expenses, inability to hold Trump accountable, and of course the raging pandemic). There's compassion fatigue and people are exhausted - and often grieving.

What's even worse is that far too much of the focus on things that are only making everything worse. The stupidity. It astounds me. (Vaccines in salad dressing? Really? Do you hear yourself?)

Yes, I know that sounds like the exact same complaints someone from the other side would make.

I don't want to talk about it, as it's getting harder and harder for me to care about their opinions too. (There was a NYTimes article I haven't read, because I don't really want to give them the click, but it seems to be discussing why and how men without a college education are getting left behind, and like... it is really hard to care. They still have so many advantages, and they could have supported systems that would have helped them. Helped all of us. And instead they've doubled down on insanity, and somehow we're still supposed to care about them rather than all the harm their insecurity has done.)

But railing about all that foolishness wasn't why I wanted to write this.

It's more... I dunno. I'm tempted to try to ignore all of it, really. But I don't think it ultimately helps.

Or rather, I think it's a bit like sticking your head in the sand. You might be able to pretend things are fine, for a while. You may even be lucky enough to spend your entire life thinking that.

But I do think there's an observable, objective truth. And pretending that everything is fine - when it clearly isn't - just leaves you at the mercy of others.

Hmmm.

That's not quite the tone I wanted to get at.

I've been thinking a bit about hermits. Ascetics. People who give up on society and go live a simple life in a cave or a desert or something. 

And there does seem to have been some value in that? I am not honestly criticizing the people who have made that choice. Sometimes it's important to make space for yourself, to gain perspective... and there's a rich history of meditation and other traditions associated with all of that.

But.... it's somewhat easy to do certain things when you're living in a way that is designed to encourage that. It's a lot harder to find that sense of inner peace when you're dealing with the typical modern life, with all it's demands and distractions.

Easy to sit in a cave and talk about how we should love one another, or the universe or God is love. Less so when there's some idjit who just cut you off in traffic, and you forgot that thing, and you have twenty different things to do before it's time to figure out dinner and maybe (just maybe) get twenty minutes to yourself before heading to bed. (I am somewhat lucky to have more space to think about certain things, but that also comes at a cost. As in, if I'm reading a book and typing a blog post there are other things I'm not doing. And while I've enjoyed working from home, I totally understand how much more challenging that can be for parents whose children are either remote learning or too young for school.)

It seems to me that someone who can maintain that inner peace while dealing with all the usual stresses is probably a bit more solid in their beliefs than someone who only achieves it through isolation and cutting themselves off from society.

I'm kind of doing that stream-of-consciousness thing though, and I'm getting sidetracked.

I'm more concerned about becoming a hermit because it seems like I'd be abandoning any effort at changing things. 

Plus it'd leave you unprepared and unable to do anything about other people's decisions.

That is... you might live peacefully for a while. Perhaps even get lucky enough to do so for the rest of your life. 

But let's say climate change is real. Eventually you will feel the impact of that, no matter how remote your cave. Maybe your cave is in a region that isn't badly affected, but then it might draw the people displaced from regions that are. Or you'll have to change your diet based off what starts growing in the new climate. 

Sort of the same thing with other potential disasters, like nuclear war and the like. We're increasingly interconnected, and you would have to go to great lengths to be somewhere NOT affected. 

Better to be involved, and help prevent any such disasters before they happen... then to ignore it all. Like what, you think the powers-that-be aren't insane enough to let such disasters unfold? The last couple of years have made it hard to believe any such thing.

So I don't think hermitage is really the answer. But I'm not really sure what is. I don't mean to dismiss the forces for sanity that do exist. They're out there, I see them...

It just feels like it's not enough. 

Is that how people felt during the height of the robber barons' power?

Why is it so frigging hard for the people willing to spend gobs of money on everything except loving thy neighbor and treating their employees with decency, respect, and a reasonable living wage that their priorities are not just wrong but that they're sabotaging themselves in the process. 

Why are so many of us forced to suffer because of these nincompoops?