Rot, Ikon

Like a Byzantine mosaic…

This is one of the trees downed by the freak snowstorm…last week? The week before? (Tommyknockers, tommyknockers, knocking at my door…) It made me think of a mosaic sun–do you see it, with the branches as the rays? Those branches, though dead and brittle, speared deep into soft wet dirt, holding the trunk up like a magician’s trick. If the tree isn’t hauled off it will keep rotting, providing nourishment to the grass, homes for nesting things, a purchase for mycelium that undergirds the existence of more complex life on earth.

I stood and looked at it for a while, thinking of Byzantine mosaic ikons, with their vivid colors and eerie depth. Those feed one, too. Any art, even that of rot and disgust, is a banquet. And it teaches us to glimpse the world through another’s eyes, if only for a moment.

I’m taking a sanity break from social media, and the news at large. I simply can’t handle one more piece of bad news. Especially when it might be some rancid piece of fuckery I predicted years ago and was told “oh, you’re overreacting, oh, you’re overemotional, oh, you’re so liberal.” If being possessed of a respect for reality, a working brain, and the usual portion of human decency and empathy is “liberal”, then yes, I’m one, and if you’re calling that a bad thing it says more about you than it does about me.

Be kind to yourselves and each other this weekend, my beloveds. If you’re struggling with All This, you’re absolutely not alone.

See you in a bit.