E Pluribus Aaron

There's No Place Like Home

I’m nothing without my family.

That doesn’t mean I’m not an autonomous, autopoetic “Individual.” It means that said Individual is composed of parts, and rests within a nest of others also so composed.

The Car in Which I Learned to Drive

And my family often saves my ass when I get too close to the abyss.

I’m spending a little time “grounding.”

There’s been some uproar in my life and, like Anne in the film The Valley of the Dolls, I returned to my home town to fart around for a while.

You'll sometimes hear a parent saying to squabbling siblings “I don't care who started it.” That is to say, whatever the cause of the uproar, it is what it is and now it is time to behave decently.

Among the many values I gleaned from my parents is that, despite our differences and unique personae, we are all one family.

This is the source of my cosmopolitanism, but it is also the source of my patriotism, and my Liberalism.

It's not perfect, and it will never be. It was never supposed to be perfect. That is why we strive toward the Good, in adoration of the Beautiful, in search of what is True.

I fail, and then I get up and brush off. Then, I fail again. Repeat.

We all do. And it is only through accepting one another's failures that we can find that source energy uniting us.

That's called “Love,” and it's often difficult. It often requires hard and sometimes tedious work.

Again, I fail constantly. I sometimes feel like I'm constantly making amends — and to everyone. I’m sorry for shouting, and for slamming the door.

Which brings me to another thing I learned from my family: that the Grace of Forgiveness seems to be everywhere. And it is one of the most invigorating and unifying forces we've got going.

We are blessed to be living in an era where people are not only beginning to speak about the mechanics of individual trauma, but even about inter-generational trauma.

This offers a host of opportunities to clean this place up.

But it can not, and will not, happen if we don't accept that, despite our disagreements and conflicts, we are one entity composed of many.

We may be absolutely convinced that our attitude toward a certain issue might be correct (and it just might be, at some ideal level). But we're going to have to endure the frustration when another faction makes a conflictory legislative gain.

That can burn like hell, and I'm here to tell you that I get just as angry (and just as belligerent) as the next individual.

But we've got to love the family, and seek the norms and conventions that allow us to unify and persist, with all of the discomforts that involves.

It doesn't help to fuel the fire with more trauma. I could give you folk adages about this, but you already know them by heart.

This is not an argument to discard the cardinal virtue of Justice. It is, however, an appeal to remember that the virtue of Courage involves patience and tolerance.

The British are coming. Let's bake an apple pie and figure out how we're gonna deal.

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And Speaking of Families. . .

Today I celebrate a week without a drink. I couldn’t do it without the many people supporting me including the above, as well as friends, my psychiatrist, my therapist, and the friendly nurses at the People’s Community Health Clinic of Waterloo, IA.

I would also like to give a shout-out to the I Am Sober app, which is really a thing of beauty. Highly recommended. (Although I’m not a huge celebrant of the name.)

Here is an excellent video about the toll that alcoholism (and addiction in general) takes on families. In it, Amber Hollingsworth refers to a video by Gabor Maté which itself is highly worthwhile (SPOILER — he talks about Lou Gerhig and GILDA RADNER!!!)

With Appreciation and Affection,

Aaron