Autumn, hunting. The fading light. The wind blowing from the north. Sitting in the dead leaves, leaning against a tree. Looking forward to.
And leaning on the ground of the vegetable garden, too, this week, knees and hands in the wet earth which has frozen and a little in the snow. Time to pull up the last plants and harvest the last fruits and vegetables that were spared by the frost (still impressed, we say to ourselves, we are at the beginning of November and we are still making fresh baba ganoush with the eggplants ). A few forgotten onions, carrots and herbs persist. Another sign: many more “strange” people than usual in the village.
There is coming and going in the woods and the countryside. Every fall the same ritual. A few hundred thousand people wait or track game in the forest, in the plains, lakes, marshes or on the coast. If some do it as a social activity, the vast majority of hunters that I know go there to harvest meat and feed themselves with it, between ideology and utility or because it has become unaffordable to the grocery store. This is also an activity carried out with weapons which makes the news a little less than weapons in the Middle East. But it’s another subject, close to baba ganoush (everything is connected), I agree. We’re almost going to avoid it today.
I was at the workshop at the start of the week. A text comes in. Someone, a Jew, with whom I work in California, sends me a video of UCLA (University of California at Los Angeles) students demonstrating, marching and chanting slogans inciting to kill Jews in the name of Palestine. It’s going to blow up there too, we say to ourselves; Jewish philanthropy is important at this establishment. Well, let’s repeat ourselves.
All conflicts end up revealing our identity and the paradoxes of human nature.
We seem to forget that the gap in power (and wealth) between the elites and the rest of the population will not widen to infinity. There will eventually be a collapse, a landslide or an explosion of the social order. It will squeak before, there will be signs, we are told by those who observe. But perhaps it has started? We are certainly wary of it, but sometimes we wish it a little secretly. Because…
A little later in the week, echoing what is happening here: the failures of health systems come back to haunt us like Halloween characters who were scarier when they were prime ministers. And the beast of administrative heaviness which plagues the social body, the deficiency of the school, social and public systems. Isn’t there a strike in a few hours? We are entitled to wonder if the current governance mechanism is still the best way to manage ourselves. Could someone, somewhere invent a new way of thinking about the present?
Where did we “escape” it? And why.
Still in the workshop, I listen to Zaho de Sagazan’s first record on repeat. It’s beautiful and haunting. One of the beautiful artists, for a long time. Really talented. She is 23 years old. And now it all makes sense. She sings about the present and the future with faith. Critical and lucid.
Believing in yourself is a cycle. Which, like hunting or eggplants, come and go.
Sometimes hate, sometimes love. She sings with the intention of surviving and not being brought down. And it’s wonderful.
I was at the foot of a large white pine. The light was falling quickly (courage, there are only 45 days until the winter solstice). I hear my breathing. Frozen fingers, in front of me a deer with trophy horns. I didn’t raise my bow. We looked at each other for a long minute and remained in silence. It was so good, this silence. He ended up heading back on his way and slowly disappearing into the dirty woods. Next time, I said. Otherwise, it doesn’t even matter. Things come and go, we tell ourselves. I’ll go to the convenience store and buy a bag of Miss Vickie’s salt and vinegar if I’m hungry.