Tuesday, February 18, 2025

The future is always uncertain, but let's control whatever we can



Valentine's Day greetings to all my good friends, dear loved ones, and so many others whom I've had the privilege of meeting and knowing all around the world during my long life so far. 


Yes, as per this blog's title, the future, however predictable, always ends up with surprises, large and small, sometimes even with surprises that startle or amaze us. We may be able to predict or influence some outcomes, but not always or very often.

So much has happened to me during my long life and to everyone else here in this world, it's really been quite breathtaking, lots if surprises, both large and small. I'm sure that that's true for everyone.  

My daughter Stephanie now visiting from Hawaii, just pulled a pair of nylon stockings out of an unused drawer, still fresh in their original packaging. Why did we ever wear those uncomfortable and unattractive things, always vulnerable to "runs," which required them to be thrown away? Then, of course, we'd have to buy new ones, which may be have been the point. Fortunately, nylon stockings soon went out of fashion.  

These days, a series catastrophes and surprises affecting my family began with the election of Donald J. Trump. His election marked a whole chain of calamities, so is he to blame?  

Right after Trump's election, CoolFont, the hotel in Berkeley Springs, WV, where my son works, burned down. It was a spectacular fire. 


That meant that my son Jon was left out of a job, while trying to help support 2 sons by 2 different marriages. He then began seeking what we usually called "purposeful activity" back when I worked for the occupational therapy association. Soon Jon drove over to a friend's place in Alexandria, Va., to help her clean out her basement. While he was there, a passenger jet and weather helicopter collided over DC's National Airport, and fell into the icy Potomac River with no survivors, leaving us all in shock.

Immediately thereafter, back in my own Capitol Hill home, the electricity, heat, and phone suddenly went out, encompassing a several-block radius. The lights soon came back on again for my neighbors, but not for me; I remained overnight without phone, internet, or heat  Family and friends calling to check on me got no response. 

So, should I continue on with this litany of unforeseen events? Probably not. That's enough. 

As for myself now in my late 80s, I am still here among the living, residing alone in my home of more than 50 years. Flowers still bloom on my back porch. 


After several days in isolation, I was able to make contact with son Jon, now back in W Va., who came immediately to fetch me. Jon is still out of a job right now, as was mentioned, after the hotel where he worked in Berkeley Springs, W Va., had burned down.

Jon and I kept busy going around together. Not far from his rural home, we visited an overlook where 3 states come together: Md., Va., and Pa. The view there inspired us. 





Then a surprise ice storm descended on W Va., really rather beautiful. 

After that, I returned to DC when daughter Stephanie arrived from Hawaii and we both went back together to visit son Jon in W. Va. 

Steph has now finally won her federal job layoff appeal, authorizing her to soon her job in Hawaii as a wildlife biologist with the Dept. of Interior. But for how long, no one knows. Mr. Trump is slashing the federal workforce. 

Can you follow all this? We are just one family among many facing an uncertain future. 

Here I am with son Jon and daughter Stephanie. I also have a daughter Melanie living in Florida and granddaughter Natasha, both of them facing an uncertain future along with everyone else. 

So, what's coming next for you, for me, for all of us? 

Weather wise, we certainly never know; and for everything else, we never know either. We just make our best guesses and prepare accordingly.  

For example, on Feb. 12, here in DC, we woke up to this scene outside my front door, quite a surprise, as we've not seen snow in our neighborhood for rather a long time. 

And now, with Donald Trump back in charge of the government again, it's also hard to predict what he might do next, as not even he seems to know where his own (and Elon Musk's) capriciousness might take him--and also take all the rest of us right along with him. Trump has always been unpredictable, but seems to have gotten worse with age. He and his administration may just decide to try anything at all, disregarding law or precedent, and simply see how long it sticks. Some actions might even end up breaking new ground, while others will be ditched. Do we, as citizens, have any influence at all? Some elected representatives seem to have already given up the fight. 


I was surprised on hearing a radio interview with a released hostage in Israel/Gaza to realize I understood her, because she was speaking Spanish! It turned out she was a resident of Mexico City. 

Wash. Post,

Mexico threatens to sue Google over ‘Gulf of America’ name change


The Trump administration wants to rename the body of water known as the the "Gulf of Mexico" to "Gulf of America." 



Hillbilly Elegy was a 2016 best-selling memoir by Vice President JD Vance about the Appalachian life of his family from Kentucky. It became a movie released on Netflix. 
Author Vance is also a 40-year old Marine veteran and Yale law graduate who ran for the Senate from Ohio in 2022 and won. Formerly a Trump critic, he nonetheless became Trump's VP running mate in 2024 and was elected with him. Vance has 3 children with his Muslim wife. Once a declared atheist, he converted to Catholicism in 2019. 
Pope Francis, age 88, now hospitalized with bronchitis, has roundly rebuked the Trump administration on mass deportations, reminding Christians to love the stranger, the refugee, the foreigner. He has authored an encyclical calling mass deportations "a major crisis", seemingly a direct rebuke to Vance.

Of course, someone besides Vance is guiding Donald Trump's second presidency. Advisor Elon Musk may not have an official government role (has any been specified?), but as reputedly the richest person in the world, he has contributed substantial funds to Donald Trump's political rise and now has undertaken the task of advising the president. 

NY Times, Musk is Leading a Hostile Takeover of the Federal Government

Now Triumph's very good friend and major donor, the non-governmental official Elon Musk, is reportedly laser-focused on rooting out federal government fraud. With his own special role and responsibility still rather murky, nonetheless Musk has undertaken a full-speed-ahead campaign against government fraud. But even there, unofficial advisor Musk has been coming up short. Wash. Post, Trump and Musk can’t seem to locate much evidence of fraud


Wash. Post, Trump administration fires thousands for ‘performance’ without evidence, in messy rush

Washington DC housing market plummets as DOGE lays off thousands of federal workers | Daily Mail Online

This doesn't look like a good time to try to sell a house. 
Laid-off federal employees have called the wholesale lay-offs "the St. Valentine's Day massacre." My own daughter, a federal employee visiting me right now, expects to be fired as soon as she reports for duty when she returns home. The US economy seems to be plunging into a recession caused almost single-handily by just one man, Elon Musk, someone who is not even an official government employee. 

NY Times, Elon Musk I Leading a Hostile Takeover of the Federal Government

 (The following space has no particular significance, being just a fluke. Please move right along, skipping past this space to continue with the rest of the blog post.) )

 During long Washington's Birthday weekend, right here in my own home in DC, a group of laid-off federal employees met to try to map out an effective defensive strategy, but were unable to come up with a workable plan. 

Legislators and other officials do need to start showing more backbone against Trump and Musk. And who elected Musk anyway? 

NY Times, Palestinian Displacement in West Bank Is Highest Since 1967, Experts Say

The Israeli military launched a wide-scale operation last month against militants in the West Bank. Now, roughly 40,000 Palestinians have fled their homes. The casualty figures are lopsided, with some 48,000 Palestinians killed and 1,700 Israelis, also 166 journalists who had been trying to keep us all informed.  Of course, it might be said that the Palestinians started this war, but they would say it started in back 1948 when Israel was established.



Meanwhile, a major social/familial shift has been occurring all around the world. Not only are Americans having fewer kids--often none--but many are not even getting married or entering into relationships. Such trends are evident worldwide with individualism now rising here and almost everywhere. Each of us has only one finite life, so many have started focusing on keeping all their personal options open, committing to nothing.  

Individualistic Practices and Values Increasing Around the World according to the Psychological Science Organization. 
Social media and digital culture have amplified the importance of self-presentation and individual branding, while other manifestations of individualism are seen in personalized sexual and gender identities, the emphasis on self-care and wellness and the increasing popularity of therapy.
What does this mean now for ourselves and even for the world at large? Have we humans perhaps  gone too far already in this independent direction? Maybe it's time to start reevaluating individual and societal goals, reemphasizing the importance of stability, family, and connection, and of passing on a cultural legacy, I would certainly say, "yes." 

So what's next here in DC and everywhere else in this country and in the wider world? That's actually up to us all--to each and every one of us, both as individuals and collectively, We are all part of the ongoing flow of humankind's past, present, and future where everyone has an essential role and a sacred responsibility. Laws, rules, and customs do exist for a reason. They can always be changed, but not simply discarded altogether just on someone's personal whim. All this upheaval and uncertainty in our government has been causing chaos and paralysis. Time now to get grip and start to do something, even if it's not the optimal solution. 


Let's take a look now at just one specific and suddenly controversial health issue: vaccination. Nothing is 100% safe or effective and no eventual health outcome is guaranteed, except our own individual death. Death will come to us all sooner or later, but we'd like to go on living as long as possible, hopefully in good health and well into adulthood, even into old age. It's just a matter of odds about how long and how well we each will live.
And vaccination, which is one factor influencing those odds, is not actually 100% effective, as, indeed, is true of all health interventions. So, what are acceptable odds on vaccination? Members of my childhood family, including me, quite a long time ago, became seriously ill with measles before measles vaccines had been developed. We became very sick and miserable, quarantined at home with warning signs pasted in our front windows, and, thankfully, we all survived. But many children at that time did not. If a measles vaccine had been available then, our family would have gladly have taken it to avoid illness and the risk of disability and death. 
Vaccinations available in our current era would have prevented the following:

If anyone dies as a result, Donald and Elon should both be held responsible, along with RFK Jr. 

RFK Jr. has now been confirmed as our nation's top health official. His announced focus will be on childhood obesity, certainly not on vaccination, something he publicly opposes. Instead, he has now targeted as his main issue the use of weight-loss drugs as a threat to children. 


Wash. Post, Trump insults McConnell over RFK Jr. vote, casts doubt on polio diagnosis. 


McConnell did not vote in favor of RFK Jr. so then Trump began to publicly question whether McConnell really ever had polio as a child. How petty is that? 

Here is my message then for RFK Jr.: You are certainly free to decide to take the chance of suffering from measles yourself to avoid the miniscule risks of vaccination, but time now to reconsider imposing the sometimes fatal consequence of that illness on the rest us, especially on children. 
In fact, measles vaccines have been found to be 97% effective and, of course, when most people are vaccinated, the chances of running into an unvaccinated but infected person are very slim. 
And now a message here for President Donald Trump: As commander-in-chief, you too have a responsibility to avoid to imposing the risk of measles on your constituents. Remember that you were elected to represent the American people, not RFK Jr.. 
We all must keep on pushing back on this issue and on so many others, and also against those elected representatives who seem to have become way too acquiescent. Where is their gumption? Where is their independence? We voters have chosen our representatives to represent us, not RFK Jr., not Elon Musk, and not Donald Trump either. Trump was elected as US president, but not as the dictator of the whole wide world! His powers are limited, so let's be sure to keep them limited. Time now to all get up on our soapboxes and to make some very loud noise! Start pushing back! Make a movement! 

And here now is a very welcome development.Reuters, Major corporate law firms join legal battle over Trump policies
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Recently, an associate at Amnesty International posted the following as an admonition to keep political power in check, 

The five most lethal authoritarian rulers in history, based on estimated deaths caused by their policies, purges, wars, and repression, are:

1. Mao Zedong (China, 1949-1976)

Estimated Death Toll: 40-80 million

Causes: The Great Leap Forward (mass famine), the Cultural Revolution (purges, executions, persecution), forced labor, and political repression.

2. Joseph Stalin (Soviet Union, 1924-1953)

Estimated Death Toll: 20-30 million

Causes: The Great Purge, forced collectivization (Holodomor famine in Ukraine), labor camps (Gulag system), and executions.

3. Adolf Hitler (Germany, 1933-1945)

Estimated Death Toll: 17-25 million

Causes: The Holocaust (6 million Jews, millions of others including Romani people, disabled individuals, and political dissidents), World War II atrocities, and ethnic cleansing.

4. Leopold II of Belgium (Congo Free State, 1885-1908)

Estimated Death Toll: 10-15 million

Causes: Exploitation of the Congo, forced labor, mass killings, and starvation under his brutal colonial rule.

5. Pol Pot (Cambodia, 1975-1979)

Estimated Death Toll: 1.5-3 million 

Causes: The Cambodian Genocide, forced evacuations, starvation, mass executions, and purges under the Khmer Rouge.

All within the last 150 years. Now of the 10 nuclear-armed nations, eight are ruled by dictators or aspirants.



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