A colleague of my daughter’s from India was confused by his first Thanksgiving in America, conflating Thanksgiving Thursday with Black Friday. He commented on how unusual it was to have a holiday that celebrated consumerism! Thanks for this important reflection and reminder. I look forward to the essays to come.
Seeing ourselves through another's eyes! His experience would make a great short story and give us another way to see ourselves. If we had any time to read and think. Even if you don't go shopping this season, it takes a lot of energy to fend off the consumer madness aimed at our minds every minute.
And you didn’t need to contribute to the depletion of forests to get the recognition! Bravo! Beautiful piece! Thank you. I encourage you to see Mad Horse’s “Straight White Men” -- a testosterone-filled Christmas (widowed father with three adult sons) dealing with some of your questions (no answers) and the destruction of relationship when others see you and have expectations of you that you can’t fulfill (even straight white men!). And Mad Horse does it with terrific acting and an earth-sustainable -- but maybe not theater-sustainable -- model of “pay what you can/want”!
Oh that play sounds great and good for Mad Horse. It's amazing how long they have been around...they have managed to survive a long time on this principle! A play is a great metaphor for the idea of seeing and being seen!
Brilliant essay! I am reminded of a root question Wendell Berry once posed in a book of the same name: "What are people for?" Certainly not to despoil and ruin our only home.
Thanks for the kind response as well as passing on the root question: "what are people for?" Unfortunately we didn't come with that answer sewn into our genes. It seems to me that the crisis we are facing now makes the answer clearer: we are here to help preserve all this astonishing life!
A colleague of my daughter’s from India was confused by his first Thanksgiving in America, conflating Thanksgiving Thursday with Black Friday. He commented on how unusual it was to have a holiday that celebrated consumerism! Thanks for this important reflection and reminder. I look forward to the essays to come.
Seeing ourselves through another's eyes! His experience would make a great short story and give us another way to see ourselves. If we had any time to read and think. Even if you don't go shopping this season, it takes a lot of energy to fend off the consumer madness aimed at our minds every minute.
And you didn’t need to contribute to the depletion of forests to get the recognition! Bravo! Beautiful piece! Thank you. I encourage you to see Mad Horse’s “Straight White Men” -- a testosterone-filled Christmas (widowed father with three adult sons) dealing with some of your questions (no answers) and the destruction of relationship when others see you and have expectations of you that you can’t fulfill (even straight white men!). And Mad Horse does it with terrific acting and an earth-sustainable -- but maybe not theater-sustainable -- model of “pay what you can/want”!
Oh that play sounds great and good for Mad Horse. It's amazing how long they have been around...they have managed to survive a long time on this principle! A play is a great metaphor for the idea of seeing and being seen!
Brilliant essay! I am reminded of a root question Wendell Berry once posed in a book of the same name: "What are people for?" Certainly not to despoil and ruin our only home.
Thanks for the kind response as well as passing on the root question: "what are people for?" Unfortunately we didn't come with that answer sewn into our genes. It seems to me that the crisis we are facing now makes the answer clearer: we are here to help preserve all this astonishing life!
As good an answer as any I've heard proposed! Looking forward to the next issue of Code Red 🙂