ManicDDaily

I spent the last few days in upstate New York which was idyllic. My sister-in-law, who lives there, has rhododendrons that are almost too lush, bright, gaudy, to be classically beautiful this year.

Though as lovely as my sister-in-law’s yard was, the most amazing place was on a nearby stream, where there is an active beaver dam, and where the beavers themselves were visible, diving, swimming, dragging around bits of greenery and twigs and spongy weeds, and genuinely slapping their tails upon the beautifully reflective water.

Unfortunately, I had to come back from these idyllic scenes to the “real world” of New York City very very early today. And here I was met by the awful story of Congressman Anthony Weiner.

A lot of obvious and really dumb jokes came to my mind in thinking about the juxtaposition of my country and city objects of attention. The jokes, the fact that I would even think of them, much less allude to them, also brought up the very painful fact that crudity is contagious.

Obviously (it’s obvious to me at least), Weiner is an idiot. How else could he be so stupid?

Some deeper questions: how could he get any real enjoyment out of what he was doing? How could he do this to his wife? Himself?  Meaning that he also seems to be kind of troubled.

And then there is this other niggling point: how could he even write these kind of messages?  And the pictures?  (Ick.)

I really don’t think I’m against eroticism. But just plain out and out crudity really leaves me cold.

But the fact is–and this is the really icky part–it’s not just Weiner but the whole culture which is infected with a certain kind of crudity, fascinated with it, imitative of it.

Ugh. I’d so much rather just think about rhododendrons.