Freedom to be stupid

In law school, we used to joke that being a trial lawyer was a tougher job than being a brain surgeon.  Why?  Because while a surgeon struggled to save a patient's life, he didn't face another doctor on the other side of the table trying to kill the patient.

Somehow, that joke has come to mind as I watch what's happening in America and -- to some extent -- in other parts of the world.

We have governments making every attempt to defeat the pandemic and, at the individual level, to save their citizens from illness and, often, death.  And in America, we seem to have approximately 40 percent of the population supporting 50 percent of the politicians in their effort to frustrate every such action taken by those governments.

Requiring immunization, with a vaccine whose development was supported by Trump himself?  Those who are now considered the moderate opposition say that vaccination should be a personal choice, disregarding the effect of each person's illness on the entire population.  The more radical right-wingers claim that the pandemic is a hoax, and that vaccination is a covert governmental method of inserting all kinds of nefarious substances into our bodies -- DNA modifiers, electronic chips to control our thoughts, you name it.

Well, we might suppose, if folks won't get vaccinated, for the sake of themselves and of their neighbors, at least they can wear masks.  "Whoa!  Over my dead body!  No one tells me I have to walk around with a mask on my face!  No one puts a mask on my kid, and denies him the wholesome oxygen his young body requires.  Don't tell me that I can't sit in a cramped airplane, shoulder to shoulder with my neighbor, without a mask!  Who do you think you are?  

Our grandparents fought wars to protect our liberty to be spoiled, selfish, self-centered, ignorant fools -- and we will fight now for that same liberty!  My neighbor?  Hell, every man for himself, I say!" 

Not only do many in the minority oppose having to wear masks themselves, they are infuriated when they see other persons wearing masks.  Thus the incidents -- admittedly only occasional -- of some lout trying to rip a mask off a stranger he encounters in a bar or even on the street.

Some Democrats mutter darkly that the Republicans want to keep the pandemic alive and kicking until the next election, in order to discredit the Biden administration.  I'm not given to such conspiracy theories.  I instead see some serious deficiencies in both the intelligence and the character of a large percentage of our population.  No intentional political chicanery is needed to bring these deficiencies to the surface -- they bubble to the surface by their very nature.

Our democracy was founded by leaders who prized rationality and good citizenship, and who grew up among fellow colonists who -- while perhaps largely uneducated -- possessed these qualities in large measure.  And when our founders entertained any doubts about the existence of those qualities, they put some limits on pure democratic government.  Hence, the original concept of the electoral college, intended -- probably too optimistically -- to serve as an elitist group of semi-aristocrats who would act in the best interest of the entire population.

However implemented, do we still have confidence in the concept of democratic government?  The irrational reaction of large portions of the American public to the pandemic, and to every effort to combat the pandemic,  leave me wondering.  

Dear Old Man ...

Where did I get the idea?  I have no idea.  Maybe it's an idea that occurs naturally to a lot of teenagers with an introspective bent.

Anyway, I was 17 years old.  And one day, I sat down and wrote a letter to myself.  To myself as a "middle-aged" 30-year-old man.  A letter not to be read until I reached that age.

As I recall, it was a reasonably long letter, but not book-length!  Maybe several handwritten pages, pages in which I poured out my heart.  I sealed it in an envelope, with something original written on the envelope -- something like "Do Not Open Until 30 Years Old."  I tossed it into the bottom drawer of my dresser, a drawer crammed with the paper effluvia of my life -- including, memorably, a little notebook from second grade filled with weekly spelling tests.

And that was the last I ever saw of my letter.  Years later, after my family had moved to a different house, while I was still in college and long before I turned thirty, I checked to see if the envelope was still waiting for me.  It was gone.  Everything else that I remembered having packed into that drawer was still there, but not my letter.

What happened to it?  I'll never know.  Maybe the same Kindly Elves who often erase adult memories of childhood embarrassments and humiliations also act on occasion to remove hard copy documentations of such silliness?

I can't remember one single thing that I said about my life, my hopes, my dreams.  Nothing.  All I remember was the preamble.  At the beginning of the letter, I more or less congratulated myself for having lived to the ripe old age of thirty.  I told my future self that I reckoned he probably was well settled into whatever career he ended up pursuing, and that I supposed he must be accustomed to showing up for work on a daily basis.  

This person I was addressing was of such an Old Age, and existed so far in the Future, that it was difficult to believe I would ever be he.

In my preamble, I added that, as I wrote my letter at 17, I dreaded ever finding myself at the age of thirty.  Nor was I all that eager for regular work hours and daily routines.

I needn't have worried.  When I actually became thirty -- yes, it happened despite my fervent wishes -- I was taking the LSAT and applying to law schools.  After considerable delay, I was somewhat belatedly preparing to enter a profession.  And by the time I reached that goal, I had found that going to work daily was -- for the most part -- a pleasure.  And the long hours I worked were nothing I begrudged.

Many 17-year-olds -- at least those who end up entering major professions -- are already licking their chops as they contemplate their future professional status.  I was not one of them.  And looking back, and comparing myself with those who were already so single-minded at 17, I have absolutely no regrets.

But I do regret the loss of my letter.  I'd give a lot to read it now. 

November rain

The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

All summer we prayed for rain. The moderate Northwest Corner, where even in summer the rains visit occasionally, was scalding hot and parched, week after week. In usually cool and rainy June, we had a long string of ultra-high temperatures, reaching as high as 108 degrees (42.2º C).

Then came November, and our prayers were belatedly answered.  The "Pineapple Express" -- an "atmospheric river" from the area of Hawaii.  Two of them already.  The rains were continual, day after day.  Not were continual, but have been and are continual.  My gutters are clogged.  The water overflows them, and falls in sheets upon the ground.  It overflows the gutters where two gables meet, dumping water down an unused outdoor stairway, water that then flows under an unused doorway into my basement-level garage.

My garage has water several inches deep in places, but the water luckily does not submerge the entire garage.  Why not?  Because the garage floor is slightly uneven, and at a certain depth, water seeps under the door into the basement.  From there, it crosses from one side of the basement to the other in a winding stream, ultimately disappearing into the floor drain that an architect, now long dead, cleverly thought to install near the laundry area.  

The water therefore never fills the entire garage.  Sooner or later, someone will come to unclog my gutters.  Until then, my basement drain is sufficient to maintain the status quo in the garage.

But enough of my hydrological calculations.

The days have been getting darker.  Of course they've been -- this is November.  But the dark cloud overcast has exaggerated the usual November darkness.  Not just for a day or two, but for close to two weeks.  And the rain has continued unabated -- at times, heavier than others, but virtually never ending.  The Seattle Times saw fit to devote a feature article to the inability of Seattle residents to take their daily walks.  Walks important to us not only for fitness, not only for relief of tension, but also as daily markers around which we arrange our other activities.  For some, mainly the elderly, the daily walk is their only activity, as necessary to them as a daily visit to a grocery or coffee shop might be to others.

Less daunted than many others by water, I've been walking each day even while it's raining.  I keep my eye on my phone's weather app and choose a time when the rainfall is predicted to be less formidable than others.  I've learned how misleading predictions of rainfall can be in the Northwest Corner -- even predictions over just the next two hours -- but in general the app has been helpful, even if hardly infallible.  And as I've pointed out on other occasions, I can tolerate being drenched.  I'm insoluble in water.

But life has been nevertheless gloomy.  My cats agree -- sometimes braving the elements and returning with sodden fur, other times lying listlessly about the house when they're not snapping at each other.

But today -- after heavy rains in the morning -- the gloom lifted.  The sun emerged from the clouds.  The sun! The Golden Orb of legend!  Within minutes, some of the water was already draining from the sidewalks.  The temperature rose to 61 degrees (16º C).  My cats perked up and hastened to the window to check out developments..

I slipped on a jacket -- I didn't trust the rain not to slyly return -- and went for a walk in the Arboretum.  My God!  It was beautiful!  Everything stood out, so crisp and fresh!  The trees -- many of which still retain much of their autumnal color-- stood out against a partially blue sky.  Birds were flitting around.  

And for at least the first half hour, the normally well-trod paths of the Arboretum were empty, except for me.  I had beat everyone to the outdoors, and enjoyed a short time of solitary communion with nature.

Since then, we may have had a shower or two, but it's predicted to be generally clear skies until Thursday, and then more clear skies from Friday through Sunday.

Yeah, I know.  My weather app lies.  But I'll believe it for as long as I can.  Dryness!  I hope for dryness!  And sunshine!

Here comes the sun do, do, do
Here comes the sun
And I say it's all right.

--The Beatles

من در اردیبهشت ماه به ایران می

Eight months ago, I announced in this blog that I had signed up for a trip to Iran in October 2021.  My post received a surprisingly large number of hits.  Possibly -- no, probably -- because I titled it in Persian (Farsi).

In July, with tail between my legs, I announced that I had postponed the trip a year, until October 2022.  I was concerned partly by the Covid-19 situation in Iran, but primarily because I wanted to join relatives in Italy at about the same time.

I am now happy to announce that I've moved the Iran trip up to May 2022 -- just six months from now.  The trip is being organized by a major adventure company.  I inquired how many travelers had signed up for the trip for the two dates.  I was told that only I was signed up for October, but that they had one person already signed up for May.

Now, with my decision, the May date has two eager tourists signed up.  The trip can handle six to sixteen members, and will not run with fewer than six.  So I have to hope that in coming months four more persons are interested enough in Iran -- an extremely interesting country, both for its history and its present position in international affairs -- to sign up.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, this will be the second time I've traveled in Iran.  I know from first hand experience what a beautiful and fascinating  country  it is.  I look forward eagerly and hopefully to a May visit.
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Photo -- School kids clowning around in Tehran. (2011)

Light rail delirium

So.   I hopped on the light rail at the U-District station earlier this afternoon, and rode downtown.

Frequent readers of my blog can sense it coming -- another meditation on rapid transit.  They have seen all too often my obsession with all forms of rail travel, from transcontinental railroad travel to short urban streetcar rides.

And they would be correct.  Until a month ago, I would have been unable to write that initial sentence, because until October 2, there was no functioning U-District station.  Sound Transit's one light rail line in King County -- recently renamed somewhat grandiosely the "One Line" -- I say "grandiosely" because so far the One Line is the only line -- extended only as far north as Husky Stadium on the southeast corner of the University of Washington campus.

But, after years of preparation, tunneling, and construction, the One Line has finally pushed 4.3 miles farther north to Northgate -- the site of the allegedly first indoor shopping center in the nation, and of North Seattle Community College.  Besides Northgate, the One Line has new stations in the U-District on Brooklyn Avenue just off N.E. 45th (a station that will be more convenient for most students at the UW than the one beside the stadium), and the Roosevelt station at 12th Avenue N.E. just off N.E. 65th.

The rail line goes underground at the Chinatown/International District station, just south of downtown, not to emerge until just before reaching Northgate.  Construction above ground -- both surface and elevated -- is far faster than tunneling underground, and the One Line will be extended another 8.5 miles above ground north to Lynnwood by 2024.  The extension will include two stations in Shoreline, and a station in Mountlake Terrace.

Needless to say, I wriggle with delight at these developments.  And I'm not even discussing the Two Line, whose initial route will also open in 2024, serving the eastern side of Lake Washington, with nine stations strung across east Seattle, Mercer Island, Bellevue, and southerm Redmond. 

The day the Northgate extension opened, I was on an early train from the station nearest my house (University of Washington station) to Northgate.  I milled about the new station with other enthusiasts, and followed the walkway and the new footbridge from the station across I-5 to the community college.  I then rode back as far as the new U-District station, from which it was an easy walk home.  (I knocked off the remaining Roosevelt station within a day or two later.)

Last month's extension, together with the 2024 Lynwood extension, is expected to serve a large number of commuters from north Seattle and its northern suburbs -- workers traveling to jobs in downtown Seattle, and students traveling to the UW. With the concurrent addition in 2024 of the line serving the east side of the Lake, the light rail system will reduce the burden on the existing highway system and allow travelers to skim right past (or under) traffic jams that have in recent years become almost constant.

Our light rail system still won't allow residents to get around to all parts of town as easily as New Yorkers do on their subway system, or even as folks in Boston can on their much smaller system.  As a consolation, I suppose, our cars are much cleaner, quieter, and more comfortable than those of either New York or Boston.

None of these extensions will be particularly useful to me as a practical matter.  The route as it existed before last month already permitted me to ride to my two primary destinations -- downtown and the airport.  But you can bet that I'll be riding the rails to each new station as it opens -- but strictly as the railroad tourist that I so obviously am.

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Photo:  Northgate Station on the first day it was open.