It’s true. . .
You may never get an Answer
if you don’t ask a Question
but it’s just as true
that sometimes the best Answers
require no Questions. . .
Who Cares - What Matters
I am not the only one who
THINKS
or most certainly
F E E L S
I T. . .
But I keep looking for the rest of Summer
as soon as the last sparkler loses its sparkle
on the 4th of July
which got me to thinking about things
a little beyond Summer
and this one Summer of 2023
being the last one any of us will
ever live. . .
h e n c e:
100 Summers
100 Summers from now
I’ll be gone
and so will everyone
I know and love
(and you too, dear reader)
My name won’t be
remembered or spoken
The Okay-ness
of this is that after
100 Summers gone
is there’ll be as many
Falls, Winters and Springs
taking their places as
100 Seasons before
without much explanation
(recently written for a 15 poems in 10 day challenge for local gems)
Uhhhhhhhhh
days gone by
are never really days
g o n e. . . .
Sometimes the smallest moments of joy are the only ones that feel possible. That’s what Nora McInerny learned in 2014, when she lost her 35-year-old husband and her father to cancer and her second baby to miscarriage—all within the span of eight weeks.
Her husband, Aaron, was a “naturally buoyant person,” says McInerny, who’s the host of the podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking and author of the upcoming book Bad Vibes Only. “He just had this otherworldly ability to find the fun and the joy in anything,” she says. “I learned from him the importance of staying as present as possible in the moment, even when the moment sucks. Even as he was literally dying, he could make me laugh.” (Among Aaron’s final words to his wife: “I will always be with you … so you need to stop picking your nose.”)
It was a moment she remembers with levity, plucked out of an unbearable time. During these past few years—plagued by political strife, social unrest, and, well, an actual plague—many of us have struggled to even briefly escape morose moods. But experts say that incorporating just a little bit of joy into our lives can disproportionately enhance our well-being by reducing the risk of chronic illness, strengthening the immune system, and combating stress.
“I think joy feels sometimes like a really big emotion—like crazy happiness,” McInerny says. “But it can be a small point of light in the darkness. It doesn’t have to be throwing the light on in the dark.”
Joy is the state of feeling freedom, safety, and ease. Unlike some other positive emotions, like compassion and contentment, experiencing joy often depends on preparing for it, rather than spontaneously feeling it, says Philip C. Watkins, a professor of psychology at Eastern Washington University who’s authored many of the leading research papers on joy.
One of the best ways to usher in joy is to strengthen bonds with friends and family. “The most intense joy experiences are probably experienced in relationships,” he says. Filling your life with meaningful goals and purpose is also essential, Watkins notes, as is cultivating an open mindset—and not just to the good stuff. “If you’re open to joy, you have to be open to disappointment,” he says. “Paradoxically, in terms of experiencing joy, there has to be a willingness to experience loss and sadness.”
If you’re not sure how to go about sparking joy, start with some self-reflection, advises Brie Scolaro, a licensed social worker and co-director of the New York City-based and LGBTQ-focused Aspire Psychotherapy. First, take an inventory of what joy means to you, and when you last experienced it. Ask yourself: What’s standing in your way of feeling joyful?
Then, think back on your favorite, happiest moments. Doing so will trigger some of that same joyful energy (just as reflecting on sad memories will make you feel upset). It will also give you a hint of how to achieve more joy in the future.
Next, “make a plan to bridge the gap between what you know brings you joy and what you’re currently feeling,” Scolaro says. What actionable steps can you take today to increase your odds of experiencing joy?
Finally, make sure you’re present enough to soak in joy when it washes over you. “Are you listening to your friends speak? Are you tasting the beer that you’re drinking? You have to be able to register joy,” Scolaro says. “Joy is in the moment. Building the capacity to move back to the present moment—like through meditation—is the best way I can think of to be present to joy.”
Here are a few ways to achieve small moments of joy in dark times
Robin Shear, a life coach, speaker, and author based in Detroit, has an emergency plan for those inevitable times when everything feels awful. Instead of spiraling—and it would be so easy to hop on the merry-go-round of doom—she turns to her “joy bucket list,” a tally of all the things that make her joyful: test-driving fast cars, being spontaneous, sharing new experiences with her family. She suggests others do the same, storing it in their phone or some other easily accessible place.
Having a physical reminder is helpful, “because there will be times in your life when you don’t feel joy. When life really hurts—and when you’re needing to rise out of that—it can be difficult to think about what will bring you joy again,” says Shear. “If you already did the work and made your list on a scrap of paper, you’ll find it’s much less challenging.”
Every morning, Deborah J. Cohan has a cup of coffee in a colorful ceramic mug. She begins looking forward to it the evening before. Another favorite part of her day: Going for a nighttime swim under the stars. “I think there’s something about joy that’s multisensory,” says Cohan, a professor of sociology at the University of South Carolina, Beaufort. “You smell it, you taste it, you see it—it’s a heightened sensory experience.” Think about ways to schedule pleasurable habits into your day. Then savor the anticipation of them, because that’s part of the magic.
There’s strong research indicating that gratitude fuels well-being. But sometimes it feels like too much of a stretch—or, as McInerny puts it, like “a blunt-force object to force people into a better attitude.” If keeping a gratitude journal or otherwise expressing thanks isn’t a path to joy for you, think about more creative ways to reflect on and appreciate the good parts of your life.
When McInerny’s son broke his arm right before the summer, he was sentenced to a giant cast that rendered him unable to swim or participate in other fun activities. “The day he got it off, he was like, ‘Say goodbye to my cast, Gerald,’” she says—revealing that even in a bummer situation, her son had created a cute, funny nickname for his orthopedic device. It reminded her to find something lighthearted and fun in every crummy situation. Now, she looks for a “daily Gerald,” or one small thing that’s good about even a bad day.
You’re never too old for a recess break—a sentiment backed by ample research. Even short amounts of physical activity, in particular, can elevate your moodand cut the risk of depression. Shear likes to schedule a 5- or 10-minute play session once or twice a day. “It’s an appointment with yourself. And whenever that time comes, you stop what you’re doing and get to spend a few minutes doing whatever makes you feel good,” she says. Shear has spent recess breaks hula-hooping, for example, and likes to set a fun ringtone on her phone as a notification that it’s go time—the adult version of a recess bell.
When McInerny gets lost in a black hole of gloominess, she calls someone she loves. The conversation might last just a few minutes, but that’s enough to lift her up.
When she’s particularly overwhelmed, she looks for other small, tangible ways to connect: If she goes for a walk, she’ll try to catch someone’s eye. Or she might mail a friend a card. “Whatever I can do to feel connected to other people is really helpful,” she says.
Music is a reliable way to spark a few minutes of joy, says Melanie Harth, a psychologist based in Santa Fe, N.M. She suggests making a happiness playlist full of upbeat, inspiring songs that make you want to bust a move, and then turning it on whenever your spirits start to falter. “I dare anybody to go on YouTube and watch Pharrell Williams’ Happy or Sara Bareilles’ Brave and not feel a little better”—or give up on your gloom and start dancing, she says.
Robust research indicates that helping other people, or getting involved with a cause that’s important to you, is correlated with well-being. Look for an opportunity to give back, in even a small way: by planting a tree, donating blood, or contributing to a friend’s online fundraiser. “It can help us get out of our scary little minds and into something that’s more important,” Harth says. “And it can also help catalyze an unexpected moment of joy. You never know when that’s going to happen.”
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. . .
J O Y
maybe you find it most
when you create it in others. . .
When it comes to our ETHICS these days sometimes it’s less speaking and more hushed whispering or worse. . .a shushing
Jill Suttie from Greater Good Magazine took a look behind the not so transparent ethical curtain to give us a different look at our ethics, or lack thereof. . .
When we read the news, it’s hard not to get depressed about the state of the world. Stories of vitriolic politicians, unethical CEOs, and indifference to the suffering of others fill its pages, leaving us feeling like goodness and morality are nowhere to be found.
According to a recent Gallup poll, people in the United States think that morality is at an all-time low. But, according to a new study, this belief is likely an illusion, based on the way our minds work—not a conclusion based on evidence.
In the study, recently published in Nature, researchers looked at several surveys of hundreds of thousands of Americans and people from 59 other nations around the world. In the surveys, participants had shared their views on whether honesty, ethical behavior, and moral values had been increasing or decreasing in their society or country.
In every country polled, people tended to think moral, ethical behavior was on the decline. This belief held steady no matter when the survey was given, too (whether 1949 or 2019)—suggesting that people always tend to see morality as waning in their lifetime. This perception seems unlikely to be true, says lead researcher Adam Mastroianni, formerly a postdoctoral student at Columbia University.
“You might think that people are sensitive to things happening around them or in their country, and that dictates what they think about people getting better or worse (from a moral conduct standpoint),” he says. “But it doesn’t seem that way, because pretty much whomever you ask, and wherever and whenever you ask them, people give you the same answer—people are less kind today than they used to be.”
To further study this, he and his coauthor, Daniel Gilbert, conducted their own surveys polling Americans about their views of present versus past morality. They asked people to rate how “kind, honest, nice, and good” people were then compared to past years (2, 4, 10, or 20 years earlier) or compared to when the participant was born or turned 20 years old. The researchers also considered the age, political orientation, gender, race, education, and parental status of the participants, to see how that affected their answers.
In all cases, people believed that morality was in steady decline. It didn’t matter if the comparison was made between now and two years ago or now and 20 or more years ago.
“It’s not just that people think the 1950s were great, and then it got worse in the ’60s, and it’s been bad ever since then,” says Mastroianni. “People think, even in the recent past, that people treated one another with more kindness and respect.”
Some people saw more moral decay than others, though. Politically conservative participants thought morality was dropping more precipitously than liberal participants did (though liberals also saw morality in steady decline). Older people tended to see more decline in morality than younger people, too. But it didn’t seem to be because of their age, but rather because they were considering longer stretches of time (for example, comparing current morality to when they were born).
“Older people do say over the course of their lives that there’s been more decline than younger people do; but, of course, their lives have been longer,” says Mastroianni. “Young people are basically on track to look like older people when they get older—which suggests that this isn’t about the idiosyncratic experiences of individuals, but about the way that human minds work.”
None of this proves that morality isn’t in decline, though. Perhaps people’s perceptions are accurate, and we really are becoming less kind and ethical over time.
But past evidence suggests otherwise. As psychologist Steven Pinker notes in his books, based on hundreds of studies and surveys on societal trends over time, there is less violence and fewer wars in the world than there used to be (despite what people think), and crime is generally down. At least some research finds that people tend to be less selfish these days than in the past, and common myths about generational character differences—that Boomers are selfish or millennials are more entitled—appear to be unfounded.
Adding to that evidence, Mastroianni and Gilbert analyzed some other available surveys: Between 1965 and 2020, over 4 million respondents around the world had reported on their own and others’ moral behavior, in response to questions like “Were you treated with respect all day yesterday?” and “Would you say that most of the time people try to be helpful, or that they are mostly just looking out for themselves?” and “During the past 12 months, how often have you carried a stranger’s belongings, like groceries, a suitcase, or shopping bag?”
After analyzing these responses, Mastroianni and Gilbert found that, no matter the year, people saw their own behavior and the behavior of people around them as generally good, with little personal experience of immoral behavior to back up their belief that morality was slipping. This was true 90% of the time, says Mastroianni, and was true for both Americans and people from other countries.
This is why Mastroianni thinks that people’s views around moral decline are an illusion.
“If people are far less kind today than they used to be even just a couple years ago, it should be easy to find some evidence of that shift. So, if you ask people how they were treated today, fewer people should say ‘yes’ today than they did five years ago,” he says. “But we find no evidence of that going on. In fact, we find pretty strong evidence that it’s not going on.”
So, if morality isn’t going down the tubes, where does this misperception come from? There could be many reasons, but two stick out for Mastroianni: our tendency to focus more on the negative than the positive in life, which media exploit by emphasizing negative news; and our tendency to remember good things more fondly, while the badness of bad memories fades with time. When we are constantly bombarded with stories of unethical, immoral behavior from a handful of bad actors, we give them more weight than our own personal experience. Similarly, if we try to remember what the world was like in the past, we may look at it with rose-colored glasses.
“If you put these two phenomena together . . . you can produce an illusion where every day the world looks bad, but every day you also remember yesterday being better,” says Mastroianni.
Why does this matter? Mastroianni says that it’s important to know if society is actually in moral decline or not. We need goodness and kindness to function as a society, and if those are missing, we’ll need to focus on changing that.
On the other hand, if it’s an illusion, we could be spending time trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist. He points to Gallup polls in which a majority of Americans say they think government should address the moral breakdown of the country—which might be a waste of time and money and take away from other important priorities.
Unfortunately, our biases, while leading us astray in some ways, are also fairly hard-wired—and for some good reasons. Being alert to negative news can make us more cautious and keep us safer, and looking at the past more benignly can help us feel good and move on from bad events in our lives that might otherwise keep us stuck.
Still, Mastroianni worries that if we have an overall pessimistic view about people’s morality, it may interfere with trusting others, which could lead to social problems. It might make it harder for people to do business with each other or have the courage to go on dates or form loving relationships.
While he wishes our daily news diet was less sensationalist and provided more context, he doesn’t see that happening anytime soon. But one thing people could do to lessen this warped view is to try practicing a bit more humility. When comparing the present to the past or past generations to younger generations, we should be a lot more cautious about making judgments about their morality or any other character trait.
“Just because a feeling comes to mind easily—like people are less moral than they used to be—doesn’t mean that you’re actually right,” he says. “The ease of thinking something is not an indication of its accuracy.”
BE CAREFUL OF THE LENSES YOU VIEW OTHERS. . .
Just SEE them in a way
that they feel
R E C O G N I Z E D
Much to ponder in this song performed by the award-winning Becky Buller. Let your mind paint the picture your Heart needs to see that'll give you more Heart and less attack. . . MORE HEART, LESS ATTACK Be the light in the crack Be the one that's been there on a camel's back Slow to anger, quick to laugh Be more heart and less attack Be the wheels not the track Be the wanderer that's coming back Leave the past right where it's at Be more heart and less attack The more you take the less you have 'Cause it's you in the mirror staring back Quick to let go slow to react Be more heart and less attack Ever growing steadfast And if need be the one that's in the gap Be the never turning back Twice the heart any man could have Be the wheels not the track Be the wanderer that's coming back Leave the past right where it's at Be more heart and less attack Be more heart and less attack Be more heart and less attack I stuck my hat out, I caught the rain drops I drank the water, I felt my veins block I'm nearly sanctified, I'm nearly broken I'm down the river, I'm near the open I stuck my hat out, I caught the rain drops I drank the water, I felt my veins block I'm near the sanctified, I'm near broken I'm down the river, I'm near the open I'm down the river to where I'm going (My thanks to Becky Buller and friends.)
A Lady asked an old street vendor: “How much do you sell your eggs for?” The old man replied“0.50¢ an egg, madam.” The Lady responded, “I’ll take 6 eggs for $2.00 or I’m leaving.” The old salesman replied, “Buy them at the price you want, Madam. This is a good start for me because I haven’t sold a single egg today and I need this to live.”
She bought her eggs at a bargain price and left with the feeling that she had won. She got into her fancy car and went to a fancy restaurant with her friend. She and her friend ordered what they wanted. They ate a little and left a lot of what they had asked for. So they paid the bill, which was $150. The ladies gave $200 and told the fancy restaurant owner to keep the change as a tip.
This story might seem quite normal to the owner of the fancy restaurant, but very unfair to the egg seller. The question it raises is;
Why do we always need to show that we have power when we buy from the needy?
And why are we generous to those who don’t even need our generosity?
I once read somewhere that a father used to buy goods from poor people at a high price, even though he didn’t need the things. Sometimes he paid more for them. His children were amazed. One day they asked him “why are you doing this dad?” The father replied: “It’s charity wrapped in dignity.”
Being A Caring Catalyst won’t cost you anything but it’ll make you richer than any lottery winning. Invest in what compounds by one kind moment to the next one and it’ll no longer be about mere facts and figures, because it’ll figure much more than any known fact. . . .
MAKE SURE YOUR CUP OF KINDNESS
IS ALWAYS FULL ENOUGH
FOR ANOTHER GULP
SO THAT OTHERS
MAY DRINK DEEPLY
WITH A QUENCHING
THAT’LL NEVER KNOW
ANY OTHER THIRST. . .
MARCH 19, 2018 was when this was first posted on YouTube and with well over 20,210,965 views I question just what boulder I’ve been living under, especially when it popped up on my YouTube feed, maybe not so randomly this past week. Hmmm.
I really like when certain things come across my YouTube feed without me trying to search for them. When I get something like this, it’s almost as if it’s a divine intervention or message that I need to hear at that time I need to hear itwhich means that as you’re reading this blog post this morning it may be the time that you need to hear or see you too; especially if you weren’t even aware of its existent much like this under the boulder dweller.
Two my favorite singers and talented, songwriters, Ben Platt, and Lin- Manuel Miranda combine to mash songs from Hamilton and Evan Hansen together…why? Not merely because it sounds good, because they want to bring a message of Hope. From what? For what? A better world? So I did a quick Google Search to get the “WHAT FOR” of this song and:
A portion of the proceeds from this record will be going to the March For Our Lives Initiative. Donate now at https://marchforourlives.com/.
John D. Rockefeller, the founder of the Standard Oil Company, the first billionaire of the United States of America and once the richest man on Earth was asked by a reporter, “How much money is enough?” He calmly replied, “Just a little bit more”
Is John D. right? Is JUST A LITTLE BIT MORE, really enough or is there ever an ENOUGH-NESS that’ll satisfy. . .When Rockefeller was asked this question he had a net worth of about 1% of the entire US economy. He owned 90% of all the oil and gas industry of his time. Compared to today’s rich guys, Rockefeller makes Bill Gates, Jeff Besos, Elon Musk and Warren Buffet look like paupers; and yet he wanted
“JUST A LITTLE MORE.”
Maybe before we can know how much is ENOUGH, we’ve got to define
E N O U G H
. . .and dare consider
ENOUGH
is more than just an amount
(but also an attitude)
MUCH-NESS
HOW MUCH
is never a question
to be Asked
yet is always Answered
HOW MUCH
isn’t found in an
Enough-ness
Much-ness
is daring to Give
a More-ness
than you can expect
to ever receive in a
Getting-ness
MUCH-NESS
is when a
Giving-ness
means so much more
than a piddle Getting-ness
MUCH-NESS
takes on an unimaginable hue
that can’t be found
on a painter’s palate
but always at the end
of your Soul’s brush
waiting to paint anew
the landscape scene
that completes us all
as it becomes a
Giving-ness
eclipsing the horizon of any
Getting-nesses
. . .S O M E T I M E S
the shiny empty plate
waiting to be
SHARED
more than
PASSED
is all the
ENOUGH-NESS
necessary
I F
it’s indeed more than a
passing partaking. . .
May your ENOUGH-NESS be Another’s as well. . .
HOW MUCH
is more than a question
is more than a quest
is more than a hope
is more than a wish
is more than a dream
IT IS A DIFFERENCE
. . .maybe the real question is:
WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE IN YOU. . .
MATTHEW T. JOHNSON, ELLIOTT JOHNSON did some digging around and came up with some interesting findings
In October 1936, 200 men marched from South Tyneside to London to protest against the poverty and unemployment in their town, Jarrow.
Nearly a century later, Jarrow is taking part in a small pilot schemeto test how universal basic income (UBI) could tackle financial insecurity and health inequalities—which continue to plague the town. Under the scheme, two groups—15 people in Jarrow and another 15 in East Finchley, London—will receive £1,600 a month for two years.
This micropilot will produce new U.K. data on the impact of the basic income in these communities, particularly the stories and experiences of the people that participate. This can be used for further research on the effects of UBI on a larger scale in these communities. This will help show if there is a case for a national basic income, or at least more comprehensive U.K. trials.
UBI generally involves giving a regular cash payment to all adult citizens. It differs from existing welfare systems that are conditional on people’s assessed needs.
In this pilot, participants are paid the same amount as a separate Welsh government pilot that involves people leaving care. The Jarrow and East Finchley pilot is focused on a broader, locally representative pool of people in each of these communities.
The project has been based on our research on basic incomes, which suggests that tackling financial insecurity is essential to promoting public health. This is a particularly important issue now because the effects of COVID and the cost of living crisis on Britons who are employed, self-employed, or who run small businesses have left many people at risk of destitution.
Financial insecurity has risen to levels unseen in generations. Evidence from the Child Poverty Action Group shows millions of Britons face fuel poverty, while the campaign group End Fuel Poverty Coalition found that 1,047 people died in England from living in cold, damp homes in December 2022.
The Bank of England’s commitment to a gradual and sustained increase in interest rates has exacerbated the rate of repossessions without addressing inflation caused by factors largely beyond consumers’ control.
This has created a second pandemic that will only get worse: mental ill health. Our recent report shows the only way we can bring this current crisis to an end is through bold interventions.
Universal basic income (UBI) is a radical but, we believe, feasible alternative to the existing, failing welfare system. It could reduce poverty to unprecedented levels, address inequality within and between regions, and massively improve the nation’s health.
The U.K. government has committed to realign health care so that it’s not just about treating the ill, but preventing illness in the first place. One of the best ways to do this is to eradicate poverty and reduce inequality.
The idea of the state redistributing resources by providing an adequate, regular, and predictable payment to citizens is radical. It turns the discussion about welfare on its head: from a payment to a select few with no other means of satisfying their needs, to a payment that protects those in, as well as out, of work from the threat of destitution.
One of the key, and often overlooked, consequences of this is its potential contribution to public health. Basic income set at an adequate level could boost public health in three ways.
First, by reducing poverty, it would increase people’s ability to satisfy their basic needs by helping them to afford better food and housing.
Second, by reducing financial inequality, it would also give people the option to leave abusive, damaging environments. This would reduce stressand stress-related illnesses. The pandemic has highlighted the dangers of people being unable to escape these environments, and the potential long-term impacts on health are significant.
And, third, by giving people a more predictable and secure future, it would increase their perception of their lifespan. This could lead to changes in behavior in the process. People with clearer long-term futures may be less likely to engage in hedonistic activities, such as drug and alcohol misuse, and more likely to engage in exercise and health-promoting activity, according to our research.
While there are examples of people “binge spending” following large benefit payments, some evidence suggests that those that feel they have some kind of future ahead will spend money on activities that enhance their health, such as healthier eating and fitness. On the other hand, people facing destitution are more likely to engage in short-term, hedonistic behavior, since they feel unlikely to have to face the long-term consequences.
Such effects would be most keenly felt in those parts of the U.K., such as the north of England, midlands, and Wales, that suffer most from the low incomes, inequalities, and general hopelessness that contribute to ill health.
The NHS made health care free at the point of use. Three decades after its implementation, the Labour government sought to understand why health inequality persisted.
The resulting report highlighted that people’s social and economic circumstances shaped their outcomes. To reduce health inequality, we need to deal with these circumstances, which have rapidly declined since the 2008 global financial crisis. And UBI can do this in the three ways outlined above.
Future generations may look back at recent discussions about UBIs with the same confusion we feel when thinking of opposition to the NHS in the 1940s.
The solutions Britain needs are just as far-reaching as those implemented in 1945. Basic income is one such solution that could be as popular and transformative as the NHS.
C H A N G E
is literally in your Hands. . .
How will you use it
o r
will you just
THROW IT AWAY
We did a lot of traveling last week, to Niagara Falls to Dayton with nary a time for a quick car wash and my car literally got BUGGED. The car wash couldn’t remove all of the mix mash of bug guts; it needed some more than unusual elbow grease and with sweating dripping down my face and slow diving off of the tip of my nose, I stood and wiped my face and THERE, there it was; a thought and then a flood of words that found its way into a poem, not just about bugs on a bumper and crusted across my windshield but about the randomness of our living and our dying; the vast unpredictability of
IT ALL. . . HENCE: SPLAT
Is it all willie nillie
some hocus-pocus predestinated Chance
A random bullet
Out of control car
Avalanche
Shark bite
A fallen tree limb
An elevator cable snap
Plane crash
All
wrong places at the wrongest of times
ALL so unmathematically
equating into a
SPLAT
No one ever sees coming
WE
like the Severely unsuspecting unnamed Bug
SPLATTED
It was never my intention to
harm, maime, Kill
Yet, just the same,
SPLAT
It ended up a glorious Yellow
but so very indistinguishable on my bumper
across my windshield
And Now
just like that
as I turned on the Shower
I spied a spider
frantically trying to get out
of the fast sucking swirlingly
towards the Drain—too late
for a rescue attempt
The Splat became a deadly Splash
Proving it’s always more than One Way
but always, still, A Way
S P L A T
What Pow, What Splash, What Kerplunk
SPLAT
Awaits us
If a bug, a flailing spider
not exempted
what of us
I don’t know
But make no mistake about
Knowing it does