I don’t really feel like writing right now, but I certainly don’t feel like working either. I was already having a hard enough time concentrating. Then I had my annual review with my boss, who gave me a “Meets expectations” grade, a 3 out of 5, even thought almost every single individual measure was “exceeds.” Why the discrepancy? He says it’s because there are “quotas” on how many “exceeds” he can give out. But considering I’ve gotten that rating, or higher, every year for the last 4 years, I have to wonder if it’s not somehow related to the fact that I am telecommuting full-time, while everyone else is going in to the office twice a week – have been since March. I was too for a while, but sitting in a packed meeting room with 14 other, unmasked, possibly unvaxxed people, with no ventilation, was not my cup of tea. I asked for an accommodation based on anxiety, and was granted one. Of course, he *can’t* hold that against me technically, but is there any way to prove that’s *not* the reason I got the lowest grade I’ve ever gotten on a review? And that’s after taking on additional responsibilities this year also. Yeah, I’m not happy. But alas, I am whining – first world problems. I am EXTREMELY fortunate to have a job, one that pays pretty well, and that I am able to work from home still. I am trying to remember that. But I didn’t start this post just to bitch. So why did I?

I was IMing with a Twitter friend yesterday and agreed that it’s probably not good to doomscroll all day – that it can get depressing, and isn’t the best use of time. I told her I think I am “addicted” lol, and that it’s hard not to when so much is going on. But she made some great points, and I though to myself, “Yeah, maybe I should cut it down a little bit.” And so I thought I might do that.

Then today, I get on Twitter, and the ‘trending’ section is filled with all kinds of doomy stuff: Finland announced it’s joining NATO (and Sweden too) which Russia is vowing to retaliate for; the hashtag “stockmarketcollapse” is trending; North Korea has reported their first ever (yeah, ok) case of covid, and has declared a national emergency, total lockdown (also, they launched 3 ICBMs into Sea of Japan same day). And that’s after I came across a story about the heatwave in India and Pakistan being so bad that some birds are getting heat stroke and literally falling out of the sky. It’s true – unreal as it sounds:

https://www.reuters.com/world/india/birds-fall-sky-heatwave-scorches-india-2022-05-11/

Then there is the hepatitis outbreak in children – the one that is still being called “mysterious” by some in the US, but that most people recognize is probably related to covid. And of course, at the same time, the EU announces they are dropping the remaining mask mandates on flights because – well, that makes sense, right? Smh.

I can’t even count the number of times every single day I read a tweet from someone saying that this time we find ourselves in is absolutely surreal. Oh, and then there is the leaked Supreme Court draft saying they are going to overturn Roe v Wade – can’t forget that little piece of Handmaid’s Tale/dystopian goodness. The sheer number of concurrent messed up things happening is absolutely mind-boggling.

So what are we to make of, or do, about all this? Well, a large part of the population seems to be completely apathetic, to all of it. They go about their lives as if nothing is going on – nothing at all. And regarding the pandemic, if you try to talk about it at all, or bring up precautions, they just kindly ignore it, or suggest (or insist) that it’s “over,” and you are being “paranoid” or an “alarmist.” That we just need to get over it and get back to normal. And this is all while cases are going up again, new variants are taking hold (BA.2.12.1, BA.4, BA.5, etc), studies are showing long covid is much more common than thought, etc etc. This post is really sloppy, really disjointed and chaotic – kinda like the world is now, at least to those paying attention.

I have been suffering from a bit of physical anxiety today, and actually had it this morning before I read about too much of this stuff. My chest feels a little tight, breathing shallow, attention scattered. I was wondering if maybe a big solar flare or CME isn’t getting ready to pop off…? There’s a big spot facing Earth right now, AR3007, so it’s possible. But it probably is just all the different stuff going on. And more so than that, the apparent apathy, lack of recognition, lack of concern by so many people. It’s like, are these people alive? Are they conscious? How can people just plod along like nothing is going on?

I guess the simple answer is that they – we – have to. We have bills to pay, mouths to feed, people depending on us. So we can’t just freak out, sell everything, and move to a tiny house off the grid – even as much as we want to. And we – I – do, trust me! Lol. No, we have to find a way to maintain, to keep the wheels of capitalism churning, for ourselves and our families. But damn if it isn’t getting harder and harder. It’s like there is a HUGE tsunami building on the horizon. You can see it, as it grows bigger and bigger. But it’s impossible to discern just how far away it is. Will it be here tomorrow? Next week? Next year? Never? And when you point it out to other people, they just either scoff, or say that you are making too much of it – it’s probably just a little wave that looks like a tsunami; that there have been people for years saying it was going to hit, but it never has, and never will.

But I feel like it’s getting very close now. Will it be a nuclear exchange between Russia and NATO (the US)? Will it be a giant Carrington Event style CME? Will it be a truly lethal variant of covid? Will it be something else entirely that we aren’t even aware of yet? Will it be all of the above?

And that’s just the short term doom. Long term, we have the drought in the West – we are literally running out of water. We have the brutal climate impacts like India is experiencing – temps too hot for humans or other lifeforms, which will create millions of climate refugees, and likely food shortages. There’s an article that came out recently suggesting we are entering the “Pandemicine” – an age that will be defined by all kinds of new viruses and diseases spawned as a result of climate change. Holy shit – that sounds pretty damn bleak, does it not?!

Now I have always considered myself an extremely spiritual person. And I have “known” since I was young that I would get to see the ‘apocalypse,’ end of the age, return of Christ, whatever someone wants to call it. And I’ve also had some intuitions/messages that when the time came, Spirit would take care of those who wanted to endure unto the end – that some kind of accommodation would be made for us – perhaps through the unlocking of latent abilities that would allow us to survive, maybe help from “above” (aliens? return of Christ/Quetzlcoatl/etc)? Maybe something else? I don’t know exactly. But I do know that I am starting to wonder, and HOPE that those messages/intuitions had something to them. Because it seems like things are getting pretty precarious.

And to be sure, things could continue on this slide for years. But it seems pretty clear that we have passed over a threshold, we’ve crossed the Rubicon, and we are in the age of consequences. I do believe that life is eternal, and I am not so much afraid of dying as I am of things continuing to degrade, slowly, painfully, over several years, only to eventually croak, not ever having gotten the chance to learn what we are truly capable of as human beings. I find myself wishing that someone who thinks like us would win a huge lottery or something, and buy/build a place where we could all go to create our own little island of sanity and survival to try to navigate this apocalypse without having to worry about paying bills, etc. We have guys like Elon Musk with billions of dollars, who Tweets out boner insults about Bill Gates. Why can’t one of us get at least a little piece of that wealth to use for a positive end? I’ve been hoping something like that manifests, but it hasn’t yet. I’m still hoping and praying.

I’m not going to link this on Twitter. It’s honestly a bit dark and depressing, it is. And I really don’t want to be the one to spread more fear. But I have to get this stuff out, because some days, like today, I feel like I am living in a bad B movie, or I’m losing my mind – I’m crazy, and all these “back to normal, everything is great” people are the sane ones.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk about living in our current dystopian age 🙂