Interesting times

It is pouring snow, pelting snow, snowing like many of us have never seen before; in Portland, Oregon, a city where, in the last decade, it has very seldom snowed. As I write this, snow is piling up faster than some people have ever seen. I took this photograph of Sue, out hunting for her blip, at about 7:30 p.m. I’m writing this blip two hours later, and the snow is two inches deeper. Bella's mother's plane has arrived, and the whole family is slowly driving home from the airport in this blizzard as I write. 

Nor is the weather the most amazing thing that's going on in Portland. In our houses and on our computers, we are engaged in a great whirl of conversation. As we approach the Women’s March on Washington and our local version of that march on January 21, exciting conversations are happening: about vulnerability, about race, about the intersections of class, gender and race; about transgender women, about non-binary women, about men who are allies of women and those who are not. About privilege and prejudice, about oppression and dominance, about fascism. The women’s march in Portland is being organized by a few very talented, capable women of color who are building community as they go. Everyone I know is talking--in person and on the internet--about values, about politics, about how we can relate more usefully to each other, about how we can relate at all to those who elected the incoming President. 

Our Orator-President, a man of great elegance, has said farewell to the nation. A very different kind of man lurches toward the future.

We are living in interesting times.