My regular sleep pattern has disappeared; now I’m all over the place. Today I woke up an hour and a half before my alarm went off. Now it’s catching up to me and I’m sleepy. I could go back to sleep, but I want to take advantage of the situation by writing early. Now if I only had something to write about.
I’m making progress programming Budgiedome. I have my usual source of anxiety; more people want to play than we have room for on the schedule. I must tell people, some of which are friends, that they can’t play. I’m trying to save some spots for people that get chosen to play the Emerging Artist Showcase. Falcon Ridge told applicants they’d hear by June 10. The list probably won’t be made public for another week.
I want the world to love the music I love. My dream is to schedule music regularly. I blew my chance last summer when Rockwood Music Hall game a slot in August and my anxiety stopped me from filling it. When I think about that my focus switches to not letting that get me depressed. This is part of why my therapist has me make a list of things I accomplished, to remind myself that I can succeed.
I spend a lot of my time being annoyed at the way other people think. I’m not talking about people being selfish, rude, or just plain mean. Everyone gets annoyed, that’s too weak a word, at that. I get upset at other people being illogical or doing things inefficiently. If someone is sitting near the back door of the bus then walks to the front of the bus to exit, then heads backwards, past the back door, it bothers me. When there are people waiting to get on the bus and it makes them wait I have a ration reason to be upset. The person is being rude and one of the people being inconvenienced is me; the bus will spend more time in the bus stop. But it even bothers me when nobody is around late at night. There’s an irony to this, I’m irrationally irritated by people being irrational. There is some reason behind it as the same kinds of thinking carry over to the rest of their lives and that has serious consequences for everyone.
There are many problems with our political system, there’s the electoral college and the pernicious power of money. As bad as those are they are not the biggest cause of dysfunction. Look at what’s going on in Europe, Brexit, Spain’s inability to form a stable government, Italy being controlled by a coalition of two parties with diametrically opposing views of what government should look like but allied because of the desire to blow up the status quo. The biggest problem in democracies are the voters. Look at all the stupid things you read on Facebook, not necessarily about politics. In any sports discussion you’ll find people very certain of things they know nothing about. Then these very same people choose the government. If people would think for themselves money wouldn’t have the influence it has. Politicians can get away with making poor policy to favor donors because those corrupting campaign contributions let them buy enough ads to convince voters to vote for them.
I’m not advocating abandoning democracy. No other system makes sense. Sure, things would be better if the people running things made the best policy, but who decides what the policies and who those people are? There’s no objective measure like Wins Above Replacement, for public officials. If the people don’t choose then it becomes the already powerful that choose. That rarely turns out well.
We are left with improving the electorate. That’s how I rationalize my annoyance at people doing stupid things, but it’s also true. The tough part is finding ways to do it. I try to do that. I try to do that here, on Facebook, and talking to people in person. How often have you heard people compare politicians they don’t like to Hitler? “The first thing the Nazis did was take away people’s guns!” I’ve seen people make the same sort of arguments against Trump. That logic is no different than saying, “He’s trying to make the trains run on time. You know who else made the trains run on time? Mussolini! He’s a Fascist!”
People exaggerate the misdeeds of others. “She used a thumb drive to grab a file off her computer. That could have infected the computer with spyware. That could let Russia hack into defense department computers. She’s guilty of treason!” That specific reasoning is what got me writing about this. A friend said that a person committing a misdeed is guilty is trying to create the worst possible consequence of it.
I curmudge because I want the world to be a better place. Whatever I say or write is just the tip of the iceberg. Most of it just bounces around my brain because stating it won’t change anything for the better. It might make things worse. I let it out by complaining about people not understanding the WFUV Question of the Day and people using the wrong door on a bus.
Tonight, I’m seeing a favorite musician I haven’t seen in years, Marcia Ball. I got the ticket from the WFUV member line. I won two months in a row. The only two I tried for. The other was Madeleine Peyroux. That’s the advantage of my tastes differing from most listeners to the station.
Now for breakfast. I’m thinking sausageeggandcheese on chocolate chip toaster waffles. Don’t judge me.
Wise Madness 