Scattered

I've had a pleasant but scrappy and unfocused day in which I was busy all the time and accomplished nothing, shot a batch of really unsatisfying pictures, walked three miles around town, and finished the book I was reading about pirates in Somalia. I feel how privileged I am that I get to live like this, and then I feel guilty, because with all this leisure I ought to be doing something useful.

In case you wonder, Somalian pirates are not very bad guys. They seldom kill anybody, the exception being Americans who sail around the world in yachts full of Bibles, trying to convert people to Christianity--this gets on their nerves, but then again they probably wouldn't have killed the missionaries if the US hadn't been chasing them with four warships and a fleet of helicopters, which made them really nervous. Basically they're just trying to make a living off the sea, and they would much rather do that than kill anybody. Most started off fishing, and when the fishing was bad, they went for whatever else they could get. They like to sit around chewing khat and daydreaming. I'm also reading the book Freespiral recommended, Stop What You're Doing and Read This, in which I love the essays by Jeanette Winterson, who makes me feel about reading the way I did as a child, and Nicholas Carr, who says the internet is rewiring our brains.

The best part of my day was having tea with a man I met at the Elder Caucus of Occupy Portland. I love hearing people's stories. His parents were secular Jews in Chicago. His father repaired shoes and his mom ran the shop and sold religious objects--mezuzot for the Jews and crosses for the Catholics. He had a passion for justice and marched with Rev. King in Chicago as a teenager and joined SNCC and became a revolutionary by 1970. Then he became a union organizer, got a degree in Labor Relations and moved to Portland with his wife in 1980. She's a teacher. He says he's looking for a way back to the revolution, or at least to a serious movement for peace and justice. Says the Occupy movement is the closest thing he's seen to substantive change in years. Has hopes for it, but also has doubts. "Where are we going with it, really? Have we got a focus?" Hell if I know. We keep on having meetings and planning rallies and marches, and I guess it's better than sitting on the couch watching TV and eating bonbons.

So now it's heading for 10 p.m. and I'm posting this scatty blip of stones and fallen camellia petals. I'll probably delete it in a few days, but it's really where I am today. Seriously lacking a focal point.