GOP Gospel: Family Values II

Day 15 of my Lent project. For background, please read this.

A reading from the Gospel according to the GOP:

I have come to bring peace to the earth, that all may be united in following me, and enjoy the fellowship and unity of the Family of God. For just as the nuclear family is intended by God to be an indivisible unit of love and fellowship, so it models the greater Christian family which, united in love of the Father, enjoys the peace that the Father intends. Should one break away and, through his obstinacy, create a stumbling block to divide the family, he is counter to the will of the Father and thereby a tool of Satan! For indeed it is through the love of the family that we know the love of God, and strong nuclear families are the building blocks of a strong nation.

( Luke 12:49-53 )

I have heard the line about strong family values being the foundation of a strong nation so many times, but the only truth it points to is that the speaker knows absolutely nothing about Imperial Britain.

Polar Ennui

Well, I think it's finally happening – after nearly a year of lockdowns and isolation, it might finally be getting to me.

I was supposed to embark on a bikeventure today, to scout out the route to Linton, but I looked at all I had to do before teaching starts on Monday, and went back to sleep instead. My sleep has been undergoing a slow attrition for a couple of weeks now, as I am consistently waking up with the birds and can't seem to get an early night to compensate. I tried to make a go of it this morning but I was shuffling about in a half-doze and could only think about going back to bed, so after breakfast I did, for three whole hours. I can't say I'm good as new but it's slightly better; however it feels like 10:30 and it's already coming up to 3.

In the earliest expeditions to overwinter in the polar regions, there was a phenomenon called 'polar ennui', where people would get listless and disinterested as the winter dragged on. In later expeditions, a rigorous programme of lectures and entertainments was put on through the winter to combat this, and for the most part that seems to have worked, though some people inevitably suffered from SAD and there may have been a dietary component as well. I think I am beginning to understand where that came from, now ... I have a good diet and access to a whole internet's worth of compelling radio and streaming shows, but self-imposed entertainments only go so far when there's no structure to back them up, and self-imposed structure is barely better than no structure at all.

A couple of years ago, I set off to teach, hard on the heels of a demanding animation gig, and was already exhausted at the start of a two-week energy bonanza from which I usually take a week to recover. That wasn't great. This year, I feel like I'm going into it already tired, and I have been doing comparatively nothing. Maybe the stress of packing and catching the plane would have given me a jump start, but no one's allowed off Plague Island or into Denmark unless on 'essential' travel, and not even Steve Bannon could spin an animation dialogue class as essential in any way whatsoever. So I'll be teaching it from the dark little desk in my bedroom where I do pretty much everything else, and not being hammy with a big whiteboard in front of an audience. We'll see if I manage to hold anyone's interest at all ...