Month: October 2016

I am voting today by absentee ballot. Minnesota allows absentee voting without requiring any excuse such as being out of state or in the hospital.

I should have submitted the ballot two weeks ago when I first got the form. The reason: to put this whole election behind me.

For a brief period I was actually concerned that Trump could win. Now, that looks impossible. I also look back at the short Bernie Sanders insurgency. Social media made him seem like an actual movement, when he was not. This was exacerbated by journalists who equate Twitter with the nation as a whole. The Vermont senator who did not talk to any of his colleagues, did not caucus with anyone, and promised free everything could have lost the election for Democrats to Trump.

Still, I wonder at times what the difference would be. I learned recently that 80 percent of the federal budget is already earmarked before the national Congress even convenes each year. It is tied up in untouchable legacy programs such as Medicare and Social Security and national debt interest payments.

In addition, I wonder at the significance of little symbols of party affiliation when everyone’s behavior seems to be the same. For example, what is the difference between two car commuters, one of whom has a Republican bumper sticker and one of whom has a Democrat bumper sticker? When it comes to environmental outcomes especially, the difference vanishes.

This is a problem for me. In 2012 I voted for Jill Stein when I knew Minnesota would go for Obama. But I recently found out about her equivocating on vaccines and radiofrequency exposure. I wish we had a Green party in the US that was strong on environmental issues but did not pander to the anti-science crowd.

I firmly believe in being politically active. I think people can have an impact. For example, I’ve seen the way neighborhood groups and preservationists in Minneapolis and Saint Paul have obstructed density and transit improvements. But perhaps I should look at politics as only one tool. Other hopeful tools might include technological change, cultural shifts and my own personal affiliations.

I enjoy eliminating clutter, so I thought I would do the same for my media consumption. I want to screen out information that does not contribute to decision making or self-improvement. I also want to make sure that when I am seeking learning or entertainment, I do so deliberately instead of mindlessly, so that I can enjoy it.

I uninstalled the mobile Facebook app and now check in once a day on the desktop site to see any notifications. I send two or three interesting articles to my Kindle instead of browsing Feedly endlessly. I reduced my browser bookmarks bar. And I avoid hitting the refresh button on any of these sites and apps.

The impulse to declutter came when I noticed that all these websites are converging on the same bottomless page format – a feed. In addition each feed is personalized because of my own selections and the company’s algorithms. Accordingly each feed was presenting me with the same content. Reddit, Feedly, Facebook, Pinterest, Stack Exchange, Youtube, and the Google articles that appear below the mobile search bar were all giving me the same stuff. Even my podcasts are about those same topics. Thanks to the site and app design there is no reason to leave; all you have to do to chase the next hit is keep scrolling or keep tapping the right arrow.

There may be disadvantages to decluttering that I haven’t yet noticed. And cutting things out is an imprecise approach. It would be better to take Jacob Fisker’s advice (from Early Retirement Extreme) and instead of cutting things out, engage with the same information but at a higher level of abstraction. The problem is that I don’t quite know how to do this and in the book he did not elaborate. It’s easier to eliminate large swaths of clutter and then selectively re-acquire things when a need arises.

I went for a nice walk along the Minnehaha Creek with my mom recently. Walks are pleasant for her despite her dementia because each moment is embedded in a context. She does not become restless about where she is supposed to be or what she is supposed to be doing, which is a common anxiety for her lately.

Fall colors are at their peak around here. Along the creek and elsewhere bright yellow tends to dominate because of the ash trees. Once you recognize their distinctive gnarly bark, you see ashes everywhere. Then they become easy to overlook.

I overlooked something important recently when a coworker suddenly quit. She gave her two weeks notice and all, but it was jarring to realize someone I spent thirty hours a week with would simply not be around anymore.

My nerves strike somewhat predictably, whenever there is a degree of anticipation involved. When the time came to hug and say goodbye, my heart was pounding. She and I shared a bond, but I never told her she was important to me, and I didn’t make enough of an effort to learn about her life.

Maybe after an event like that I can finally start learning the lessons of the immediate past: that every day is an opportunity to connect; that there is no comfortable future where you have all the time you need to tend to true relationships; that the time to be there for others is now.

Those ash trees are threatened by the emerald ash borer. A decade hence, 90% of them may be wiped out. Not just the thick yellow canopies, but the crunchy brown leaves under your feet, and the curious bunches of long flat seeds, and the unmistakable bark, could be gone.

All those parts of the tree that you can currently see and touch any time you want could be just a figment and a memory. This provides all the more reason to take that walk along the creek with a loved one whenever you can.