Clarissa's Blog

Last night, Klara turned on the TV, sat in front of it, and announced, “Shh, Mommy. I’m watching the TV!”

The TV was tuned in to MSNBC, as always, and there was a segment about Trump.

“What is this, Mommy?” Klara asked.

“This is the president,” I explained.

“Why, Mommy?” she asked. “Why is he the president?”

The question was too deep for me to answer, so I said, “Because it’s his job.”

“Why is he so yucky, Mommy?” she continued.

“He’s not yucky,” I said, feeling that the conversation was running away from me. “He’s the president.”

“Why is he talking funny? Pee you, president! You, silly goose!”

I obviously don’t talk to her or around her about Trump or anything political. But toddlers are like radars. They have direct access to their parents’ subconscious.

This is something so American that I will never understand it. Fifty-plus-year-old people angrily refute allegations that they might have kissed each other on the cheek 40 years ago. High school yearbooks that have yellowed with age are found to be “extremely hurtful.”

If it’s ok to write in the NYTIMES that you are “horribly hurt” and “sickened” by a yearbook from 1982, then it’s definitely fine to be devastated by the absence of horseback lessons today.

Democratic socialists see social democracies “as an improvement over the present situation in the United States,” said Maria Svart, the national director of the D.S.A., but “it’s really still society and the economy functioning on terms that are set by the capitalist class. Our ultimate goal is for working people to run our society and run our workplaces and our economies.”

And that’s exactly what we heard verbatim from our Soviet leaders from the first day to the last.

My only question is whether this Maria is the stupidest person in the world or if she’s actively malicious. It’s like those folks with “compassionate gulags” I linked yesterday. I can never figure if these people are all intellectually challenged, so to speak, or evil.

It’s like people walking around calling themselves national socialists and saying they favor the final solution but it’s not the bad final solution and not the bad national socialism. It’s just a coincidence the terminology is identical.

Mendoza is a Colombian writer, and I suddenly realized I haven’t read a Colombian novel since grad school. After finishing the novel, I googled it and discovered that Buddha Blues has been savaged by critics. I loved it, though. It’s completely all over the place, and if you remember to bring your sense of humor to the reading, you might enjoy it.

I’m glad to see that Colombian literature has recovered from the depredations of the horrible magical realism. There is nothing magical about Buddha Blues. It’s Zygmunt Bauman all the way.

Let’s run a little experiment. How old is the woman in the picture?

If you know about this experiment, please don’t spoil it for everybody else. For now, I can say that my experience didn’t confirm the findings. Or maybe I’m developmentally stunted.

When I see moms on local FB start a post with the words “Please help. I’m desperate and just don’t know what to do. I’ve been crying non-stop for 3 days,” my Ukrainian brain immediately thinks that this will be followed with “I can’t make the rent / my kid’s been diagnosed with something / I lost my job / can’t pay the bills / can’t afford surgery, etc.” My heart skips a beat and the floodgates of compassion open.

So when the post continues with “I was planning to pay for horseback riding lessons for my 3-year-old but they say they have no openings for the next two months,” this produces cognitive dissonance for me.

I’m very happy people have no greater cause for desperation than that a toddler will have to wait for her horseback lesson but is there really a burning need to be so dramatic about it? If people think it’s cute to adopt this persona of a spoiled rich brat, it really isn’t.