What to say on a bitter cold Wednesday morning?  There is a bitter chill in my soul too.  The House of Representatives is on the cusp of voting to impeach the President today.  They will almost certainly vote.  His supporters — in a blatant, undisguised advocacy of institution-destroying, society fracturing violence will defend him.  That is the existential chill of this morning.

What to do?  How to act in the context of this darkness, and what it portends for the future?

Action and being must be improvisational, because in the knife edge of each moment one is afforded resources and obstacles.  One must execute, to the best of one’s ability, the type of human, the form of humanity which one has claimed, chosen for oneself.

That Socrates was right, ‘The unexamined life is not worth living,‘ is not obvious to common sense.  Lots of us just let life happen, without much if any reflection, examination.  “Don’t worry, be happy,” is the maxim of a warm, well fed, well clothed American gazing rapt into an iphone screen.

I offer for your contemplation of the long term, the prospects for your family, friends, your country and even all of Nature beyond the few remaining years of your life — this song by Annie Lennox.  She is the songwriter along with David Stewart.

The song is about a death of a beloved Aunt, a shocking death by suicide.  The lyricist takes a beneficent view of the event, that of a becoming angel, a coming home, that redeems what was a troubled soul.  Should I even ask, do we not all need  redemption?

Some things just have to run their course, cannot be halted by any type of intervention.  Many events on their face, are an unmitigated catastrophe. This is as it has always been.  Yet, a long view is possible, that over the long arc of history, — all will be well.

The lyrics are after the youtube video.

Angel

Underneath this canopy of snow
Where fifty-seven winters
Took their toll
Where did you go?

And I believed in you
I believed in you
Like Elvis Presley
Singing psalms on a Sunday
(Where did you go?)

Well she’s gone to meet her maker
Back to where she came from
Come to save her soul…
Come to save her soul…
Come to take her home
‘Cause it’s late and past
Your bedtime
Well past bedtime

Angel
My angel
Fly over me
Angel…

She took her life
Within her hands
She took her life
Within her own two hands
And no-one can tell her
What to do now

And I believed in you
I believed in you
Like Elvis Presley
Singin live from Las Vegas
(Where did you go?)

Well she’s gone to meet
Her maker
Back to where she came from
Come to save her soul…