I live in a state that’s governed by the most amazing collection of fools and sociopaths, and they’re inflicting extraordinary harm on the place. But I jumped in the car this afternoon and drove up to Morro Bay, a little town on the Central Coast with a few thousand residents living on low hills around a harbor that’s full of seals and otters. I walked along the north end of the harbor, and then stood on a rock in the semi-dark and listened to the sound of otter breath. Pfft, they go, as they dive and then surface. That’s them in the foreground.
I decided to get on the road because of this (screenshot below, click this link to watch the video):
I recognize the places in that video, and I miss them all.
If you’re not following Keely Covello on Substack, you should. She’s writing about both realities of California: governed by appalling failures, full of good lives in beautiful places. The far-left culture of ruin clings to a fifty-mile strip along the western edge of the state, but the rest of California is so different it’s like you hit a membrane when you pass between the two places.
I’ll be back to writing about politics momentarily, but pause for a moment. Don’t let the sick political culture that weighs so heavily on all of us, the shameful violence and the ghoulish gaslighting, break you. I agree with this post from Bad Cattitude: “this is a war for the actual nature of reality.” I’m finding it useful to get out of the house and go see some actual reality, and I hope you are too. And I wish Substack allowed photos in the comment threads, for obvious reasons. Consider all the words in this post a cheap excuse to give you a picture of some otters in a nighttime harbor.
About that “war for the actual nature of reality”: At Tom Klingenstein’s website, I very recently published an essay on the collapsing authority of left-oriented institutions as they descend into a state of insistent unreality. We all see it.
More very soon.
After last year’s election and especially since January there has been a noticeable change of tone, one of hope, freedom, even excitement. Your posts reflect that and I’m always an avid reader of your stories. Nevertheless, I can’t but worry that this is a short lived moment, calm before the storm. Institutions are totally corrupted, an important and significant part of the population lobotomized, the rich donors richer by the day. What will happen when the tables turn? I really wish Trump stood by his promises, stopped American interference abroad, and focused each and every day on cleaning up the mess in his backyard. Unfortunately, I believe he’s lost the plot.
Beautiful pictures - in words and visual images Chris. I remember Morro Bay - spectacular reality. Thanks for this timely reminder of the nature of reality and the reality of nature!