Stacy Horn's Blog, page 16

Decompressing

Well, thank God. Biden has his work cut out for him, so I can’t relax exactly, but still. I can hope again. For some reason though, today I am back to feeling anxious. It must have to do with the emotions one experiences after getting out of an abusive relationship that lots of people are writing about and explaining.

I don’t know what to do about how divided our county is and the 70 million people who thought Trump was just fine. Some people will grudgingly admit that maybe he wasn’t such a great human being, but their 401k’s are doing just fine, so … fuck all the people who are being hurt and dying (and I’m not just referring to people dying because of COVID)? Fuck all the rollbacks hurting our environment and animals? His support of dictators? Our standing with the rest of the world and our allies? His denial of science and all the repercussions from that?

I don’t know how to find a middle ground, especially when people have been convinced that the lies they’ve been told are true and actual facts are not. I take heart that Biden has had experience with working with people on both sides of the aisle.

But today I am anxious. Because we’re still in a pandemic and I can’t go back to normal yet. Oh! That brought up a happy thought. Look at Biden’s advisory board:

“Biden’s transition team on Monday announced members of his coronavirus advisory board, which will be led by former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy, former US Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. David Kessler and Yale University’s Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith. Other members are Dr. Luciana Borio, Rick Bright, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, Dr. Atul Gawande, Dr. Celine Gounder, Dr. Julie Morita, Michael Osterholm, Loyce Pace, Dr. Robert Rodriguez and Dr. Eric Goosby.”

Will Dr. Fauci play a role?? Googling. He will ask Fauci to remain! Good.

I was going through my library of photographs recently and I pulled out a couple I wanted to do something with. This was one of them. I just like it. It’s a view from my roof.

Losing My Mind

I can’t relax. I need closure! I’m a complete and total wreck. I won’t be able to relax until the counting is done. I wish I had some good drugs (which I can’t take, because I’m an alcoholic, but a girl can dream). That said, I got my teeth cleaned today and it gave me such a “the world is back to normal” feeling. We’re still in a pandemic, and I’m still being very cautious. But it looks like I need a root canal, so I thought what the hell, get my teeth cleaned while I’m at it. It feels so good.

I can’t wait for the day when I can get a haircut again. I know I could get it done now, but it doesn’t seem worth the risk. The root canal I need to address because pain. I can cut my own hair for now. Which I’ve done. And it came out just fine.

A Halloween decoration I passed by today. The message on the skeleton’s hat reads: “Make America Dead Again.”

Halloween 2020

It certainly wasn’t as crowded and insane as it usually is, but people were still out and about. They still decorated their stoops and gave out candy (in various socially distant ways).

The Tardis crashed on Perry Street as it always does. That building must have mystical Tardis-drawing power.

My favorite building with signs paid a touching tribute to RBG. (Sob.)

People were creative and fun. I almost missed this, but I look down more these days to avoid tripping.

The spider came down the Jefferson Market tower.

People watched. There were a lot more people than this but I would have had to stand in the street to get them all.

Families were out and about in costume. Mom and dad! Where are your masks? (I wouldn’t want to have covered up those sparkles either.)

All the outdoor seating was taken everywhere.

And at my last stop, where I got a slice of pizza before heading home, the Easter Bunny.

A Tiny, Boring Problem

I bought a new lampshade for my floor lamp which arrived yesterday. One of my cats had knocked the lamp over a year or two ago and shattered the glass shade. New shades aren’t cheap so I’ve been putting off replacing it. I finally decided I could afford one and I picked a new shade, different from the previous shade because I never really liked the previous shade.

It’s pretty, and has the loveliest pearl finish, but I think it looks ever so slightly too big for the stand. I worried that it was going to look too small, ironically.

But then I look again and think no, it’s the perfect size. And I go back and forth and back and forth. Boring, I know, and probably the least serious problem of all the problems in the world to have. Which is, in itself, annoying. Why am I obsessing about such a ridiculous problem?? I think part of the problem is the pole holding it up is so slender. But the other shade was much much wider and I never had a problem with the proportions! Here are some pictures.

Remembering Eric Garner

I was going through my photo library, cleaning out photographs I really don’t need to save. For some reason I didn’t want to delete a single picture I’d ever taken of any of my cats. Thousands of so-so pictures have now been pared down to the best, and the most sentimental. But I don’t only take pictures of cats.

I took these photographs at a protest in 2014 for Eric Garner out on Staten Island. Six years ago. Now we have a president who has re-awoken and reinvigorated racism in America. God help us next week.

It’s a Dreary Day in NYC

I’m glad I took a long walk yesterday, because it’s too miserable out for a walk today. Oh god, I want the god damn election to be over over OVER.

It may not have been full on raining yesterday, but it was drizzly and foggy. On the plus side, this was what the skyline looked like looking up. Beautiful, right? Gray can be the most evocative color sometimes.

How to Hope

My choir meets virtually every Tuesday night, the night we’d normally rehearse, to delve into music in different ways. This week our choir director, John Maclay, interviewed an old friend, Eric Conway, the Chairperson of the Fine and Performing Arts Department Director of the Morgan State University Choir. At the end we listened to his choir sing Glory from the movie Selma.

John sent out email this morning, with some words about America and voting. His last two paragraphs provided much needed solace. I think what he said is incredibly moving.

“Finally, as you vote, remember that you are carrying the whole of us on your shoulders. The caregivers, the isolated, the ill, the weak. Those who are afraid. Those who did not have the opportunities you may have had, or the privileges to which you were born. Those who are working the phone banks and pounding the pavement to encourage everyone.

“America is one long story about people walking over the bridge. When we are turned back, as we often are, we just have to keep walking. Again, and again, as long and as often as it takes.”

The Misplaced Admiration of James Randi

I couldn’t finish reading the obituaries for James Randi. Mitch Horowitz says everything I would have said in his article, The Man Who Destroyed Skepticism.

The Lab had a contracts with the Office of Naval Research, headed by Gaither Pratt, to see if homing pigeons were using ESP to find their way. This is a picture of Pratt and his pigeons.

Resuming Dental Work

God help me, but I have the worst teeth. I’m about to resume getting a bunch of things done, and I’m pulling together pictures of my mouth and teeth from the past to help my prosthodondist make corrections, if possible. I came across this shot which made me laugh. I’m not sure how old I am here, but somewhere in my late 30s.

Apparently, if I am sitting down, there’s going to be a cat on me. It’s a law.

I voted!

You don’t need to watch the whole thing, you’ll get the idea after a minute. I’d planned to come back another day but by the time I got to the end of the line I had to join them. It took three hours! And I hadn’t eaten before I left my apartment! And I accidentally left my book at home! (Thank you Project Gutenberg, for having The Age of Innocence online for me to read.)