Now I Remember . . .

Now I remember why I avoid the news. So many days the only things that make any sense to me are the ones that are on my knitting needles, or on someone else's.

I stopped listening to the news on the radio regularly back when our son was getting old enough to listen and respond to what he heard there. At that time, guys from my husband's National Guard unit were deploying to Iraq.

(I quit watching TV, news and all, a long time before that. I can't even remember . . . might have been back in the '80's. Strangely, I miss fewer cultural references than you'd think. They must dye the ether. Or something.)

It was just too depressing, too nerve-wracking, to answer questions about things the newscasters would say. They would say something like, "Eleven soldiers were killed in Iraq today," and the child would say, "But they weren't really dead, right, Mom?"

I already felt nervous enough about whether my husband would end up deployed, without having to figure out how to answer questions like that. So I stick to reading the news in the newspaper.

If I need more news than that, or want a different perspective, I pick up a lot of news from the international email groups I'm on, and there is always "Watching America" and Newseum.

I don't view it as hiding from reality, although what's so great about reality these days? It's all about what I choose to concentrate on.

The word "concentrate" is directly related to "concentric", like the concentric circles that make up a bull's-eye target. What am I ringing myself around? Positive, creative stuff that makes me happy, that spreads a little joy in the world, or horrible, crappy stuff that makes me want to scream, grab someone by the ears, and head-butt them like one of the Nac Mac Feegle?

"Ach, here's a headful o' dandruff for ye, ye bogle!"

(Not that I don't think that many people in higher office wouldn't benefit from a good headbutting, mind you.) (Extra points if you can untangle a triple negative.)