In 1623, in one of a series of prose Meditations titled No Man Is An Island, poet John Donne wrote, “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee,” affirming that the death, suffering or deprivation of even one person ultimately affects each of us. “Any man’s death diminishes me,” he wrote, “because I am involved in mankind.”
In 1940, Ernest Hemingway titled one of his books, For Whom The Bell Tolls, exploring the same themes of isolation and inter-connection.
I find myself thinking about this every day as the oval office resident and his bands of thugs attack and savage immigrants in one “blue” American city after another, and starve millions abroad by ending foreign aid, also depriving them of health care, clean water and needed electricity, without a thought or concern.
There is no chance that those chickens will not, eventually, come home to roost. Already, here at home, the disgust and disapproval of his actions have spread so far as to have cost his party (no longer Republicans, just Trumpians), several crucial elections.
His actions have also awakened, in many millions of us, a recognition of the inter-connection with those who are attacked, a sense that we are only one or two castes away from the next targets, one paycheck away from unemployment, one accident of fortune away from a savings-draining healthcare event.
And we are turning out, showing up, and declaring “I am involved in mankind”. Let’s make sure that this also involves voting, voting, voting and working against any states that want to limit our franchise power, by ending mail-in ballots, or cutting the hours that polls are open, all moves designed specifically to suppress the accessibility of seniors, the disabled and those who work, to the ballot.
Time, eventually, has its revenge. All dictators have failed because of the recognition, by those who came before us, that No Man Is An Island. We see that we are strong because we stretch beyond ourselves and show up for each other. Good for us. And good for humankind.
Midas-Well Call It A Pay
A few days ago, I read that the zombies who make up the Tesla Board of Directors had handed the richest man in the world a contract for a trillion dollars (that’s 12 zeros, a thousand billions) to make certain that he doesn’t further sully his (questionable) reputation, and that of his company, by hanging around, and slavishly serving, the Worst President Ever.
Understandably, I had to suppress my gag response. And I was delighted to see one of my faves, Billie Eilish, call Musk out (more profanely than set out here), by labeling him a….. pathetic….. coward.
Of course Musk is required to reach several benchmarks in order to claim the hefty boost, most of which are designed, like his lottery prize given simply for voting, to be met with ease. We’ll see.
This heaping on of wealth brought to mind the story of King Midas, along with several “genie in the bottle” stories, none of which ended well. King Midas, you may recall, was a (perhaps mythical) king, gifted by the god Dionysus with the ability to turn anything he touched into gold. Unfortunately, finding that he couldn’t eat gold and couldn’t touch food, he began to waste away. Ultimately, crushed by the uselessness of gold to a hungry and lonely man, he pleaded, desperately, for an end to the “gift”.
I have no doubt that Elon will also ultimately find his gift to be a curse. After all, “Money Can’t Buy You Love”. And he seems to be the epitome of the loveless and unloved man.
Every story of being granted three wishes by a genie one has just freed from a bottle ends badly, as well. Wish for eternal life? End up with no loved ones left (These billionaires should remember that as they seek a way to extend their lives through chemistry). Wish for all the gold in the world? End up literally crushed by it.
There is a reason that so many of our oldest stories reflect the same lessons. They are hard-won truths and they are universal. Learn from the past or be doomed in the future, no matter how many national parks you scrub of commemorative monuments, or how many documents you remove from our National Archives.
Esto fortis!
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