All climate change deniers are quite welcome to hang around with me, my wheezing, near-apoplectic air conditioner, and my army of fans (the electric, air-blowing kind). The Heat Index finally fell below 100 degrees at 9:00PM last night, for God’s sake.
Which brings me to the subject of casual racism. Everything these days is tinged with racism or accusations of racism, and I almost miss the days of casual racism, which seem almost innocent compared to the weaponized racism we’re subjected to daily.
No, the racist crap from my youth I’m dwelling on a lot lately concerns the Hispanic population of Texas. My grandfather – otherwise one of the kindest, most downright decent people I have ever known – hated them with a passion. He was free with the disparaging of other minorities, notably the blasted Hun, but he reserved special ire for those Messkins. (One day we’ll talk about when I fell in love with a Latina, who reciprocated. That was messy.)
You can say my grandfather was a product of his times. That doesn’t excuse it, but I’m also going to point out my only problem with it was that, even if given the chance, he wouldn’t have changed. It was simply the way he was, at that point. I can only speak for myself, in the final analysis, and this bullshit is something I struggle with internally every single goddamn day. I’m not immune to the poison that gets hurled about every day, and right now I’ve got a build-up of over 50 years of garbage to deal with. I find myself thinking terrible, unworthy things. I am shocked, and slap those thoughts down, and wonder where the hell did that come from? But I know.
And I honestly think that every person, everyone who hasn’t gotten that Premium Divinity Upgrade, deals with it every day. Some are shocked and try to do better. Some simply accept it. Some seem to fucking glory in it.
Well. I managed to steer myself into some far-too-serious territory there.
The point I was aiming toward was, in my youth, one of the stereotypes that of the “lazy Messkin” was the guy taking a siesta, a mid-day nap. Never mind that my grandfather often took one, too. Them Messkins would crawl off and sleep at the drop of a hat, and would frequently drop their own hat. And it was one of them damned sombreros, too, I’ll bet.
Guess what? Like my grandfather, I nap too. Even when I worked in an office back in the 90s, I introduced my boss to the concept of a 15 minute nap after lunch, and it worked wonders for both of us. If there is an upside to my current impoverished part-time-only job, it’s that I get my nap in, with no problems.
And you know what the siesta was? It was finding a shady spot and sleeping through the hottest part of the day. That wasn’t laziness, that was sanity. That was sensible.
Of course, currently, it would be impossible for me to sleep through the entirety of the hottest part of the day. I can do some serious napping, but not six to twelve hours worth.
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[…] attempt to follow suit, as it is siesta time – see earlier post – and the doorbell rings after a meager five minutes of […]