Well, here I am.
As I write this, I'm sitting in a coffee shop about halfway through January of 2025 trying desperately not to to wonder about what in the actual fuck is going on in the world right now for the sake of my mental health. It feels uncomfortably like when your glasses are just a little out of kilter and your vision is messed up in subtle, deeply annoying ways that you can't quite put your finger on. Warren Ellis recently put it thus: "I am once again Not Fully Awake, though possibly that is down to being repeatedly bludgeoned by the current news cycle of The Same Four Fucking Things Forever Without End," and that seems to capture the moment nicely.
Snowpocalypse has returned to the DC area, presumably turning Northern Virginia, Maryland, DC proper, and parts of Delaware into a winter gauntlet. I've been in touch with folks who are still there, and they seem to be doing pretty well. Not too long ago I heard somebody call it a French Toast situation, i.e., everybody runs out to buy bread, milk, and eggs because they expect to be stuck at home for some period of time, and I think I'll be adding that to my lexicon. My sincere apologies and solidarity with everybody who still had to drive into work, each and every day even though the Beltway had turned into a bigger clusterfuck than usual; been there, done that, had to get my brakes redone.
Wildfires have returned to California, this time reducing a great deal of LA county to ash. Between the high winds and how hot the fires are burning... I don't know what to say. I've been in touch with friends down that way, and as I write this they're okay, but things are touch and go right now. The damage is extensive. One guy was riding around on a bike with a lit blow torch which might (I say MIGHT because I don't know, and the authorities don't yet, either) have had something to do with it. It could just as easily have been the remnants of a fire not completely extinguished, something those bushcraft books I used to check out of the library as a kid warned again. The local community has pulled together to help one another.
I can't help but wonder if this'll start happening in northern California, where I live these days. A couple of years back I started receiving notices from the insurance companies we do business with. Our renter's insurance coverage changed from $200kus to $25kus for personal property and coverage for breakables has been entirely eliminated, though the premiums have remained the same and, upon calling and asking I was basically told "Well, we can cancel your policy effective immediately, and you can do business with someone else." I seem to recall fire coverage (wild- and otherwise) being cut as well, but I just spent the last hour digging through my archive of insurance documents and I can't seem to find it. I'm pretty sure that it's not just my natural paranoia talking. Lately I've been wondering if there are any safer places that we might eventually move to, and I'm starting to think that there aren't any, only differently risky of the same magnitude. I can't say this leaves me with any feeling of confidence.
The inauguration hasn't even happend yet and CBP is already executing unannounced raids and rounding people up. During the wildfires. And they're based on the color of your skin first and foremost, your immigration or citizenship status be damned.
I've let this post sit on my laptop for over a week now. Events have progressed significantly since I started writing it. Not all of the things that've happened were one bit surprising because they said up front what they were going to do. I could go back and update what I wrote but I don't think I will. There's no point because of how fast everything transpires. You've seen what's happening. I've seen what's happening. You can take it to the bank that there will be thinkpieces, and justifications, and panic, and propaganda, and and and... but that doesn't matter one bit.
If you're going to do anything, anything at all, now's the time. If you've studied history at all you know what's happening. Put up or shut up.