A Realization
Yesterday I paid my weekly visit to my shrink, and for the first time ever, she started ranting instead of me. “Have you seen the price of flour?” she began, and then launched into the exact diatribe I’d delivered the week before about oil and food prices.
The conversation drifted to the “stimulus” we’re getting this week, the $600-$1200 that’s really an advance against next year’s tax refund and which will be counted as taxable income.
As I’ve consistently pointed out, this pittance from the Glorious Leaders of America the Great will not make a damn difference to the economy. People will use this money to pay bills, to buy a little gas, and to stock up on groceries because they’re afraid food is going to run out. Even the Douchebag in Chief seems to have realized this, as Daily News columnist Elmer Smith points out:
“Letting Americans keep more of their own money,” the president said in February, “should increase consumer spending and lift our economy at a time when people otherwise might spend less.”
There’s the rub. The president’s stimulus package has been overtaken by events. Back in February, we still had some people who “otherwise might spend less.”
But otherwise spending less is no longer an option. With gas approaching $4 a gallon, and such staples as corn and wheat doubling in price, we’re doing our part to stimulate the economy by buying a bag of groceries.
[snip]
Everyone eligible for the rebates is expected to have them by June. The checks are for up to $600 per individual and $1,200 per couple plus $300 per dependent child (is there another kind?).
That’s far short of the checks that the government has sent to Chrysler Corp. - or, more recently, Bear Stearns - when they were mired in an economic slowdown. But we’re just little people doing our little part.
“Starting Monday,” the president said Friday, during a photo op from the White House, “the effect of the stimulus will begin to reach millions of households across our country.
“The money is to go to help Americans offset high prices we’re seeing at the gas pump, the grocery store, and also give our economy a boost to help us out of this economic slowdown.”
In other words, hold up a minute on those American-made flat-screen TVs and electronic game systems the president was hoping we’d buy back in February, when the economic-stimulus package was announced.
I have already figured out how I am using my government loan, I told my shrink. “I’m getting my oil changed and my vehicle inspected,” I said. “I’m paying off some credit card debt. We’re going to split the price of an eliptical, used from craigslist, so I don’t support the actual manufacturer. And finally, I’m buying a bag of marijuana, supporting the black market economy.”
As we bantered back and forth, she asked me if I was as angry as I was a few weeks back, after Sam had gone home. During that visit, she noted that my entire demeanor had changed, that both the tone and timbre of my voice were very different, and that I was not the same person she’d been seeing for almost a year. “Nah, I’m not that angry right now, I guess,” I agreed. “It’s probably because I keep myself occupied in the garden every weekend, and I’ve been playing some music.”
We talked about that for a little bit and came to a mutual conclusion that between the physical exercise and the zen of digging and planting, that the garden has been really good for my psyche.
But not 20 minutes ago, I had a much different realization.
Just yesterday, I wrote:
Increasingly, I find myself not blogging or spending a lot of time online during the weekends. Part of this is accountable to the fact that it’s warm out and there are Things That Need To Be Done, but the other side of that is that after a week of writing at work and subjecting myself to the 24/7 hysteria known as “American Politics”, by the time the weekend is here I simply don’t give a shit anymore.
Instead of driving myself nuts on the Internets, I’m finding that the more work I do in the garden, the happier I am.
Right now, I am seething about my so-called “stimulus”. Every time I think about it I get angrier. And bopping around the blogs and the newspapers, I am getting angrier still: the Supreme Court voting in favor of restrictive ID laws days before the Indiana primary. The stupidity of Barack Obama appearing on FOX news. The media’s love affair with John McCain, and my reluctant acceptance that McCain will be our next president (and he will be, mark my words).
By the time the weekend comes, my outrage meter literally can’t take anymore, and I have to retreat from all the information. It’s not that the gardening means that much to me: it’s more that by Friday, I can’t take the seething anymore. There is only so much hopelessness and despair, brought on by the stupidity of people with power that will never be held accountable for anything, that a man can take.
After asking me about my anger level, my shrink said that sometimes when a person’s not totally pre-occupied with their problems, we can get the deepest insights. I had mine today.
I don’t spend my weekends in the garden because of some back-to-the-earth sentimentality. I spend the weekends working the garden and ignoring the world because it allows me to avoid the source of most of my rage.
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