Boots and Blessings

I live in the Austin area, and I love this town. As a college student, I spent many a weekend evening down on 6th street, and when someone first posted a picture of all the bars and clubs boarded up, my heart sank, even as I understood it's for all our own good. I wasn't the only one who felt that way. And some people did something about it. The creative community came together, bringing the need for beauty together with the talent of artists. They created a "Hope Gallery" with murals encouraging Austinites to have courage, have hope, know that we are neighbors, and will overcome. While doctors and nurses are hard at work, it is artists of all types who are tending to our hearts and spirits. Galleries have -- virtually -- thrown open their doors, musicians are having free concerts online, actors are presenting plays or short pieces. Soak up the art. Feed your soul. (And if you see a tip jar out, toss a few bucks in. This industry has ground to a halt.) Art...

Hey, fam. How ya doing? Someone asked me that this week, and I responded by saying I was mostly fine, with occasional bursts of abject terror or grief. Part of this is having to live with such huge uncertainty about how transmission of covid-19 might swell, what it will do to the economy, and to life as we know it. Phew! Big thoughts. Back in 2015 (you probably can't remember that far back, the world was very different in many ways), The Atlantic ran an article, How Uncertainty Fuels Anxiety . Good article. In a nutshell, humans are unique because we can think about the future. But because the future is unknown, that can make us anxious. Especially now, amirite? We can't entirely take things one day at a time. We've got to order our groceries (sometimes weeks in advance), think through some "what-ifs" that have a decent probability of happening. But then, we have to let it go. We cannot prepare for every eventuality. And most significantly, we cannot as...