By the time you read this, I will have come home from our Thanksgiving travels and then completed a trip to California on business, arriving home the day before this posts. But as I write it, I am less than 12 hours into being home after nine days away, and the muse is upon me to write of home.
The circumstances of my birth fated me to much of my personality and outlook, in that I was born under the sign of Cancer, and we all know that astrology is hard fact. Here is a bit of that hard fact from a representative sampling of the astrological literature:
Cancerian men are natural homebodies, deeply attached to their personal space, which they like to feel cushy and comfy, with a deep, soft sofa to lounge around on. They’ll often prefer to eat their meals here, rather than stand on ceremony and have proper place-settings and sit stuffily at the table in angular chairs.
Once at home, a Cancer man wants to feel at ease and completely unwind, usually while wearing sweatpants or a robe. Even though smoking jackets and slippers have fallen out of style, you might see a Cancer man rocking this look while sitting in his big cozy chair near the fire.
Usually excellent cooks, Cancer men prefer eating at home to going out, delighting in simple repast and filling comfort foods like soups and stews. Cancers are drawn to relics of yesteryear, and often have a longing for the traditions and tastes of days gone by – so you may see his home crammed with antiques and family heirlooms. He will hold onto passed-down possessions for their sentimental value, even if they are no longer beautiful to behold.
My work involves a good bit of travel, and although I am grateful for the challenges and rewards of the life I’ve chosen, I could do without the travel. I LOVE being at home. The fact that I have chosen a partner who revels in making our space together warm and beautiful certainly helps, but even when I lived a monastic single man life, I reveled in my space.
Nine days away coming on the heels of four days away (followed again by three days away) takes its toll on a Cancer , and as I traveled yesterday (Eleuthera-Nassau-Newark-DC-Drive from Dulles), I spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about how much I loved our home, our animals, the ManCave—all the trappings of this life. I realize that it is macabre to wax reminiscent about the COVID days, but that time was a DREAM for a Cancer. I slept in my own bed, mostly. I LIVED in Adidas track pants and T-shirts. I brought Catherine a little cup of coffee to start our day. Everywhere I went, I was surrounded by the things I love.
COVID provided me with a glimpse of what retirement will be like. I wish I had a dime for every time someone tells me that I will have a hard time adjusting to retirement because I will have a “meaning” hole in my life. What they don’t seem to comprehend is the degree to which my life is centered around being in this place.
I had one of those deep moments of Cancer realization this morning when I stood before my coffeemaker and took the first sip of coffee. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had serviceable coffee in the last two weeks—but it wasn’t MY BRAND produced in MY COFFEEMAKER in MY KITCHEN. That first sip, my goodness, it was wonderful. I looked around and saw all sorts of familiar things in the dawn darkness and I was utterly content. Geese in the cove. A blanket of leaves on the ground. Dogs snoozing. A cat demanding attention (cats are apparently ALL Cancers…). I get that the things I’m describing probably appeal to everyone—but I don’t know if everyone gets how much they appeal to Cancers/Me.
Black and White
I attended the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, CA over the weekend, and annual day and a half fantasy camp for national security nerds like me. There was (as should be expected) a good deal of discussion of the Hamas terror attack on Israel and Israel’s continuing response. I was gratified in perceiving overwhelming support in the crowd for Israel and its objectives. At one point—joining in a round of applause for our Secretary of Defense committing to our friendship with Israel—I started to think about good and bad. Black and white. Right and wrong.
Nuance and subtlety are the province of adults, humans with minds developed sufficiently to realize that things are very seldom all of one thing or all of another. We tend to look at people who view the world in absolutes as immature, somehow incapable of nuance or subtlety, due perhaps to an inflexible mind. We associate intelligence with being able to see all sides of a problem, to see the shades of right and wrong, good and bad, high and low.
Hogwash.
I may at one time have been largely in agreement with the previous paragraph, but the rise of Donald Trump and his presidency cured me of that. I eliminated people from my life who professed to be enthusiastic supporters of Trump because there simply was no path to being a human in whom I could invest affection while simultaneously cheering on the most destructive individual in modern American history. This is black and white. It really is that simple, and there is no nuance or subtlety that can create grey here.
I have a new one. If you are someone who woke up on October 7th and saw what happened in Israel and did not conclude that great evil had been done to innocent people, or you woke and decided that justifiable acts had been taken, you are no longer possessed of the minimum standard of humanity to be an part of my life, friend, acquaintance, even family. You, like the aforementioned Trump supporter, have moved into the category of people for whom I have not time or energy. This is black and white. It really is that simple, and there is no nuance or subtlety that can create grey here.
Thank you, Bryan, for providing much-needed clarity on the moral failing of too many Americans who can't/won't recognize that what happened in Israel on October 7 was evil.
Welcome home