Socioeconomic

Quick note with the holidays upon us soon.

The last couple years we have mentioned in the run up to the holidays the increased chance that you will encounter friends and family for whom the accumulated wave of threats and shocks, from the pandemic itself to everything around it, as the our modern society is tested in new ways. We had a world we were comfortable with. Ideas and institutions, customs and traditions, a normalcy that seemed as eternal as the stars in the sky or the mountains towering over the seas. Problems, yes, but these were minor squalls on the mountainside, or brief clouds obscuring the night sky.

For the past several years, as all of us have noticed, the mountains threaten to topple to the suddenly raging seas, and the stars in heaven seem driven from their courses. Familiar constellations, even the North Star and the Southern Cross used to navigate from the ages seem astray–or at least guiding to less certain paths.

We’ve seen the small signs everywhere. A “Mad World’s” song of long faces in the stores. The declining civility and smiles. The impatient driving (how many near wrecks have you seen this week?). Even the memes now are small signs; trepidation now greets the new year, it seems:

And yes, certainly on energy and food, and thus the economy, there are reasons for concern. The swell of history as it begins to fill the space left behind the end of the Pax Americana.

I’m sure you have noticed that.

I’m also quite sure that over this quarter you have been quietly approached by friends and family who, maybe not at the breaking point from it all, have hit the point of honesty. The glib, perfunctory “fine, great, good…”, the Instagram veneer to lives, in response to “How’s it going?” is instead finding truth.

For some, some you know, some who have reached out to you, maybe even some of you, the catalysis of the last several years has caught up. Or maybe you are among the lucky, the very fortunate, to have not said your “hallelujah“–yet.

But for more than a few, things are not fine. They’re not going great right now. And it’s time to quit pretending they are, and reach out.

I have seen an uptick in those reaching out. I know some of the readers have as well, based on responses to the “small signs” in this section over the year.

And of course, it’s the holidays.

So just a gentle reminder that if you have not gotten these calls or emails or texts or notes or quiet conversations yet, the holidays increase the chances you will. Or will be the license you will seize if you have hit your honesty point this year, too.

Either way, be patient. Be kind. Re-build.

Clear eyes. Clear hearts. Can’t lose.

And we’ll turn to the poets again, to hopefully make these ideas “sticky”:

The story of that song, back when U2 was truly great, is that the band had hit the honesty point making this album and were ready to break up. They poured that honesty back into that song.

Speaking of… tonight is the Winter Solstice. I set this one to post to the web, and email the lists, this evening.

Yeah, you got me. Deliberate.

For the readers in the Northern Hemisphere, this will be the longest night of the year. Weather says there’s a historic cold front coming through too.

But the solstice is also a turning point in this long cycle. A cycle as long as the Earth has circled the sun.

From here on in, there is a little more daylight breaking through…

Spring… Easter… they’re going to be here soon…

<Paladin>