Come to Maine. From anywhere on the coast, just drive ten miles inland and you'll get all the colorful diverse conversation you're longing for, complete with the accent. My husband listens all day at work (in a lumber and building supplies store) to all those conversations you're missing in Manhattan. He finds it quite exhausting some days.
Maybe there should be set-ups where people trade homes for a week so that they can be surrounded by whatever culture/conversation they feel they are out-of-touch with. The first few days would be entertaining, and then it would get old pretty fast, and everyone would go home with renewed gratitude for what they have.
Here's a thought: It's cold in NYC, right? Time for a warm tropical vacation! Go to VRBO and rent a house in The Villages, FL., preferably close to town. For around $200 a night, you can have a pool, fire pit, large screen TV, even your own golf cart, and ample opportunities to converse with people who may share your background but don't necessarily share your views.
Try lileks.com -- Minnesota Nice combined with some of the most spiteful right wing nonsense. It used to be an oasis from knee-jerk trash-talk, but the poison is seeping in and taking over. I still chat there because I love to talk about old movies and crazy typefaces, but they'd probably block me if they knew how I felt about their political opinions. (They despise YOU, by the way... too successful?)
I wonder if it does me any good to hear this kind of talk, but I think that we the peeps have retreated into a kind of mental tribalism and conversation has deteriorated into an exchange of pre-fabricated venom. So I try to visit hostile territory from time to time... quietly.
Happy to see you in near-top form, Garrison. Come to Texas and I'll GIVE you a gun, because I'm one of the odd liberals who has more guns than some Oath Keepers. My wife & I raised our kids on your PHC shows every Saturday in the 80s & 90s, then I inherited guns when my elderly relatives died off.
You wrote: “…and when I went forward for Communion I felt foolishly happy. The wafer was not artisanal, the wine too sweet, but I received it with a good and grateful heart.”
I was mentally brought up short upon reading this casual reference to your receiving Communion in a Catholic Church. I am in my 70th decade; while I was raised Catholic, I long since dropped out along the way for various reasons, but one thing I do recall: perhaps THE most important teaching pounded into my youthful brain back then was that the wafer, once blessed by the priest, is miraculously transformed into the actual Body and Blood of Christ, and as such there are very solemn rules regarding taking Catholic Communion – i.e., who may receive the wafer and under what circumstances.
In the various references to your religious upbringing and experience in your columns from time to time, never have I detected any indication that you are Catholic. I suddenly imagined horrified face-palming by fervent Catholics everywhere upon reading your casual statement about receiving Communion. Astonishingly, you were not immediately struck by lightning, the roof of the church did not fall in, and communicants in line continued to receive. Imagine!
I thought that your last Post to the Host would have included at least one alarmed missive in reaction to this major breach of Catholic dogma, but since it did not, I took this opportunity to comment!
Ha! I appreciate diversity of friends too. But we disagree a lot.
I don't know how to disagree with someone in text without giving them the impression that I'm angry, so my friends have to talk to me with their voices.
I've heard good things about Nordpass and RoboForm.
You had me when you said 'Swiftian"...I thought we were going to get a limerick on Lilliputian things. Then you talked about not knowing anyone with a gun. ---Will rapier-like wit do? I also text with 2 fingers, I have 'old-nerd' calluses on both my pointers. Good luck with getting the NY out of the NY girl. Fifty years ago, I married a filly who hailed from L I and she has tuned out my mentioning that her dad was a Massapequa "Whor-er." If you get to N H again, text and I'll take you to Lowell's grave.
Here in the rural lands, some very nice people own 22 calibers, including my husband, who only uses it on varmints who refuse to be frightened away from the barnyard. It's probably been over 15 years since he's actually had to shoot anything, and life with me is slowly turning him into a quasi--vegetarian (though he still eats chickens because he thinks they're stupid - he's wrong, of course, but nobody's perfect 😉).
He's also a techie and can tame wild gadgets with a single glare. He's currently trying to convince his Dad to use thumbprints instead of passwords - his father isn't interested, but maybe it might alleviate your struggles with tiny computers. By the way, I am a very slow one-fingered typist on cell phones, too - they're too dang small!
Nah, you don’t want to go to the dark side. Just picture having a conversation with Marjorie Greene Taylor or George Santos. Do you really want to even stand next to them? Do you really want to even attempt to have a conversation with them?
Well, you could do that, I guess, go someplace where people wear guns and put down Biden and generally rail against the government, social programs, equality, schools and everything else we’ve come to hold of value, but I don’t think you’d like it. I live in a place like that. It’s probably not the worst of its ilk, but bad enough. And then when you have to watch the TV and see what these places elected to go to Washington, like the Marjorie Taylor Goons, I’d think that’d be enough to make you even more glad to where and with whom you are. But, heck, try it. What have you got to lose, except a few precious moments of your otherwise good and fruitful life.
I'd be glad to take you on a tour.... Start on a construction site shortly before noon, lunch on El Milagro tortillas warmed up in a beat up microwave then slathered with whatever the fellas picked up at La Morelia that morning, shoot a few nails into whatever needs nailing, then finish up the afternoon at the range shooting paper targets with the politician du jour's face printed on it, then hang around the store counter listening to fellas talking about the stopping power of various rounds and how dare our governor enact a ban on rifles that we only use for hunting and caressing in the evening...you get the idea.
I understand the emotion. I live in a 'burb that's the cartoon for woke liberalism, with a school system that was profiled in The Atlantic as having "a slogan for a curriculum". It's necessary to mix things up a bit.
I was in Wuhan in January 2020 and ended up quarantined for the remainder of the year. Being shut in with the locals earned me some street cred and alliances formed, and after it started loosening up we traveled all over Hubei to places American tourists don't get to, with a photo collection that's educational. I'll stop by and blow your funny colored socks off with a bunch of cool pictures of village life in China.
Thank the Lord we don't need all experiences around us, Wabash included. Who would like 6 months in the slammer for example, or getting radiation and chemo to cure a cancer, or someone sleeping in a drug-filled tent in 20 below. What we do have to do is use the unique gifts we've got and, like you, share them with others, reaching out and helping out. Use those 6 months to work on your own betterment of doing. No need to ridicule those who don't think like we do. Just recall what's going on in their opposing minds.
I've always liked that New Testament passage where Jesus told those about to stone to death a prostitute, and so He drew in the sand what's thought to be their names. They walked away. Walk away from Wabash. You've still got a lot of good work to be done.
On this the birthday of 2 of my granddaughters (ages 12 &15), your column gave me much to smile about. And I am a Republican but in my 13 presidential voting opportunities I only voted 7-6 for red so can understand some of your left perspective I think.
Come to Maine. From anywhere on the coast, just drive ten miles inland and you'll get all the colorful diverse conversation you're longing for, complete with the accent. My husband listens all day at work (in a lumber and building supplies store) to all those conversations you're missing in Manhattan. He finds it quite exhausting some days.
Maybe there should be set-ups where people trade homes for a week so that they can be surrounded by whatever culture/conversation they feel they are out-of-touch with. The first few days would be entertaining, and then it would get old pretty fast, and everyone would go home with renewed gratitude for what they have.
Here's a thought: It's cold in NYC, right? Time for a warm tropical vacation! Go to VRBO and rent a house in The Villages, FL., preferably close to town. For around $200 a night, you can have a pool, fire pit, large screen TV, even your own golf cart, and ample opportunities to converse with people who may share your background but don't necessarily share your views.
Try lileks.com -- Minnesota Nice combined with some of the most spiteful right wing nonsense. It used to be an oasis from knee-jerk trash-talk, but the poison is seeping in and taking over. I still chat there because I love to talk about old movies and crazy typefaces, but they'd probably block me if they knew how I felt about their political opinions. (They despise YOU, by the way... too successful?)
I wonder if it does me any good to hear this kind of talk, but I think that we the peeps have retreated into a kind of mental tribalism and conversation has deteriorated into an exchange of pre-fabricated venom. So I try to visit hostile territory from time to time... quietly.
Happy to see you in near-top form, Garrison. Come to Texas and I'll GIVE you a gun, because I'm one of the odd liberals who has more guns than some Oath Keepers. My wife & I raised our kids on your PHC shows every Saturday in the 80s & 90s, then I inherited guns when my elderly relatives died off.
Garrison, Your life sounds like mine. D
(In response to The Column: 01.31.23)
Dear Sir,
You wrote: “…and when I went forward for Communion I felt foolishly happy. The wafer was not artisanal, the wine too sweet, but I received it with a good and grateful heart.”
I was mentally brought up short upon reading this casual reference to your receiving Communion in a Catholic Church. I am in my 70th decade; while I was raised Catholic, I long since dropped out along the way for various reasons, but one thing I do recall: perhaps THE most important teaching pounded into my youthful brain back then was that the wafer, once blessed by the priest, is miraculously transformed into the actual Body and Blood of Christ, and as such there are very solemn rules regarding taking Catholic Communion – i.e., who may receive the wafer and under what circumstances.
In the various references to your religious upbringing and experience in your columns from time to time, never have I detected any indication that you are Catholic. I suddenly imagined horrified face-palming by fervent Catholics everywhere upon reading your casual statement about receiving Communion. Astonishingly, you were not immediately struck by lightning, the roof of the church did not fall in, and communicants in line continued to receive. Imagine!
I thought that your last Post to the Host would have included at least one alarmed missive in reaction to this major breach of Catholic dogma, but since it did not, I took this opportunity to comment!
Ha! I appreciate diversity of friends too. But we disagree a lot.
I don't know how to disagree with someone in text without giving them the impression that I'm angry, so my friends have to talk to me with their voices.
I've heard good things about Nordpass and RoboForm.
And if you're ever in Bulgaria, let me know.
You had me when you said 'Swiftian"...I thought we were going to get a limerick on Lilliputian things. Then you talked about not knowing anyone with a gun. ---Will rapier-like wit do? I also text with 2 fingers, I have 'old-nerd' calluses on both my pointers. Good luck with getting the NY out of the NY girl. Fifty years ago, I married a filly who hailed from L I and she has tuned out my mentioning that her dad was a Massapequa "Whor-er." If you get to N H again, text and I'll take you to Lowell's grave.
Here in the rural lands, some very nice people own 22 calibers, including my husband, who only uses it on varmints who refuse to be frightened away from the barnyard. It's probably been over 15 years since he's actually had to shoot anything, and life with me is slowly turning him into a quasi--vegetarian (though he still eats chickens because he thinks they're stupid - he's wrong, of course, but nobody's perfect 😉).
He's also a techie and can tame wild gadgets with a single glare. He's currently trying to convince his Dad to use thumbprints instead of passwords - his father isn't interested, but maybe it might alleviate your struggles with tiny computers. By the way, I am a very slow one-fingered typist on cell phones, too - they're too dang small!
Nah, you don’t want to go to the dark side. Just picture having a conversation with Marjorie Greene Taylor or George Santos. Do you really want to even stand next to them? Do you really want to even attempt to have a conversation with them?
Well, you could do that, I guess, go someplace where people wear guns and put down Biden and generally rail against the government, social programs, equality, schools and everything else we’ve come to hold of value, but I don’t think you’d like it. I live in a place like that. It’s probably not the worst of its ilk, but bad enough. And then when you have to watch the TV and see what these places elected to go to Washington, like the Marjorie Taylor Goons, I’d think that’d be enough to make you even more glad to where and with whom you are. But, heck, try it. What have you got to lose, except a few precious moments of your otherwise good and fruitful life.
I'd be glad to take you on a tour.... Start on a construction site shortly before noon, lunch on El Milagro tortillas warmed up in a beat up microwave then slathered with whatever the fellas picked up at La Morelia that morning, shoot a few nails into whatever needs nailing, then finish up the afternoon at the range shooting paper targets with the politician du jour's face printed on it, then hang around the store counter listening to fellas talking about the stopping power of various rounds and how dare our governor enact a ban on rifles that we only use for hunting and caressing in the evening...you get the idea.
I understand the emotion. I live in a 'burb that's the cartoon for woke liberalism, with a school system that was profiled in The Atlantic as having "a slogan for a curriculum". It's necessary to mix things up a bit.
I was in Wuhan in January 2020 and ended up quarantined for the remainder of the year. Being shut in with the locals earned me some street cred and alliances formed, and after it started loosening up we traveled all over Hubei to places American tourists don't get to, with a photo collection that's educational. I'll stop by and blow your funny colored socks off with a bunch of cool pictures of village life in China.
Thank the Lord we don't need all experiences around us, Wabash included. Who would like 6 months in the slammer for example, or getting radiation and chemo to cure a cancer, or someone sleeping in a drug-filled tent in 20 below. What we do have to do is use the unique gifts we've got and, like you, share them with others, reaching out and helping out. Use those 6 months to work on your own betterment of doing. No need to ridicule those who don't think like we do. Just recall what's going on in their opposing minds.
I've always liked that New Testament passage where Jesus told those about to stone to death a prostitute, and so He drew in the sand what's thought to be their names. They walked away. Walk away from Wabash. You've still got a lot of good work to be done.
On this the birthday of 2 of my granddaughters (ages 12 &15), your column gave me much to smile about. And I am a Republican but in my 13 presidential voting opportunities I only voted 7-6 for red so can understand some of your left perspective I think.
I'd love to meet you in Wabash Indiana!