Post mortem

I've seen a number of posts on online support groups for widows in which people complain about incidents when someone says they can relate to being widowed because they are divorced.

I can understand the frustration. There are obviously distinct differences between being divorced and being widowed. But there are also similarities. You thought you'd be spending the rest of your life with a certain special someone, and now that turns out not to be true, and you have to adjust to your new life.

I wouldn't advise that people use the "I can relate; I went through a divorce" line when trying to console widows. It's much better to simply provide a sincere offer of friendship and of being there for the person in any way you can. But on the other side, I think that widows who do hear that line should try to be a little more understanding and less judgmental.

A lot of those posts seem to have an undertone of "How dare you trivialize my loss by comparing it to being divorced?" But the truth is, the end of a relationship for reasons other than death can be as painful as the end of a relationship due to death. Unless someone has been both widowed and divorced, they can't really say which, if either, is worse, and even then it would of course only apply to their own specific set of circumstances.

On October 9, a date that will likely go alongside April 24 in my personal list of significant milestone dates, I was completely blindsided when EB told me she thought we should break up. I was quickly reminded of two previous events in my life: Cara's diagnosis with lung cancer, and Cara's death. Cara's diagnosis with lung cancer was incredibly shocking and horrific... but at least she was still there and still my partner in life and we could both be there to support each other as best we could. Cara's death was incredibly painful and sad... but at least I had had a considerable amount of time to prepare myself for the possibility of that tragedy unfolding.

This breakup wasn't even a divorce, obviously, because EB and I weren't married, nor were we even officially engaged, but we had both expressed to each other numerous times that we intended to spend our lives together. From my point of view, this came completely out of nowhere, and it feels like EB suddenly became a different person and that my EB, the EB I knew and loved, died. So I quickly came to feel that this sudden loss of a life partner, and that constant presence of love and support and friendship, might be even more painful than Cara's diagnosis or Cara's death. I also thought, maybe it's just the initial shock, and I won't feel the same after more time goes by. But now, several weeks out and as finality has settled in, I'm pretty sure I do still feel that way.

There is, of course, another factor here that was not a part of my loss of Cara.

I have come to love [redacted] as if she were my own child. That's something that EB went out of her way to encourage throughout the course of our relationship. I don't say that because I want to make EB look bad, and I debated whether I should include that line at all in this post, but my purpose in writing this blog is to give people a real and raw insight into my life, the good and the bad. It helps me for other people to know "how I really feel," and I'm hopeful that it could be beneficial to other people as well. And I've come to realize that my loving [redacted] like a child of my own, encouraged by EB, is probably the single most pertinent point one must understand in order to understand the trauma I'm now experiencing. Because I haven't just lost a life partner. I also feel like I've lost a child, and taking the two losses together, like I've lost a family. It's really awful. Every time I see a young child, I'm reminded of [redacted], and it tears at my heart.

Making the whole thing even more painful is that it does all come in the aftermath of my previous devastating loss of Cara, and after all my hard fought efforts to rebuild my life through my grief over Cara and through everything else I've been through since then. And yet another way in which this loss could be more painful is that I am able to look back fondly on all my wonderful memories of Cara without those memories being tainted in any way by what happened after. That's not the case here.

I'm sure everyone is wondering what happened. I don't feel it's my place to publicly go into great detail, but I feel comfortable sharing that EB said she realized she just wasn't ready for this and she might never be ready. Hey, being a widow isn't easy. I certainly know that myself. I feel bad for EB. I also feel bad for me. I feel bad for everyone involved!

Almost two years ago, in a blog post about my experiences with chronic pain that I wrote during a horrific recurrence of one particular chronic pain condition that began about half a year after Cara's death, I wrote, "I think a lot of people have been pretty amazed at how well I've seemed to handle [my loss of Cara]. That I was able to do so well is, I think, in large part due to the great example that Cara set in how to deal with tremendous adversity. But I think it's also partly because the aftermath of Cara's death was, in fact, not the worst period of time that I've experienced in my life."

Well, here's another entry for my personal list of "things that have happened to me that are more painful than my wife dying of cancer." It's unique, though, in that it's the only entry on that list that is not an episode of severe chronic pain. And I should remind myself that this breakup, like Cara's death, is not the most painful thing I've experienced.

I'll close this entry by mentioning that the morning after the breakup, another remarkably unlikely and bizarre coincidence joined the long list of unlikely and bizarre coincidences that have happened in my life. When I was backing my car out of my driveway, the song "All Your Favorite Bands" by the band Dawes came on the radio. EB and I went to a Dawes concert for our first date. I consider this coincidence particularly unlikely because it was the only time since (at the very least) that first date that I have heard Dawes on the radio. I know this because I would undoubtedly have made note of any other such occurrence. It was another one of those moments that would have seemed utterly contrived and hokey had it happened in a movie, except that it really happened in my real life. Lyrics selection from the song:

I hope that life without a chaperone is what you thought it’d be
I hope your brother’s El Camino runs forever
I hope the world sees the same person that you’ve always been to me
And may all your favorite bands stay together

My favorite band was EB, [redacted], and Jeffy.

"I love everyone in the world" (The wonderful heart of a child)

We were all sitting around my parents' dining table - me, EB, [redacted], my mom, my dad, my brother, and my aunt - and were digging into a delicious steak dinner when little [redacted] piped up to point out that "We forgot to say a blessing!"

When asked if she would like to do the honors, [redacted] began, "Dear God, thank you for Jeffy, and Mommy, and..." and she proceeded to give thanks for each person sitting around the table, and also for the food we were eating, but it was something else she said in the midst of giving thanks that really stood out.

"I love everyone in the world."

The more I have gotten to know [redacted], the more amazed and inspired I am by what a big heart resides inside that precious four-and-a-half-year-old girl.

When [redacted] meets someone new, she is usually very shy at first. But it doesn't take long for that shyness to pass. And when a new person comes into her life and treats her with love, she returns that love many times over. She makes sure that person knows how loved they are. She'll spontaneously launch herself at friends or family members to give them ferociously intense hugs. (Recently she did this while I wasn't looking and knocked me onto my back from my seated position on the floor!) EB is the most frequent target of [redacted]'s affections (I adore [redacted]'s random proclamations of "I love you, Mama!") but [redacted] is always sure to spread the love around. When we were leaving my parents' house after our Labor Day weekend visit, [redacted] gave each person there a drawing she had made that weekend. On the back of mine, she wrote my name and her name and drew several hearts around them. This has become a common practice for her and it's so incredibly sweet.

[redacted]'s caring spirit is not limited to people she knows. One of the most amazing things that happened over the weekend came in the bounce house that had been rented for the annual block party on the street where I grew up. [redacted] spent a lot of time jumping around in the bounce house and it was a joy for me to see her joy. My favorite part, though, was her interaction with a younger boy who ventured into the bounce house that was mostly occupied by larger (5-8-ish) children. Some of the play was pretty wild, and some tears were shed after collisions, although no serious injuries occurred. Realizing that the risk was greatest for the smallest child there, [redacted] immediately took it upon herself to watch after the little boy. She gave him gentle guidance to be careful in the bounce house. She kept an eye on him when he was in there. She helped him up when he fell. After one fall (not a serious one), she reached out to him and with love and concern in her voice said the sweetest, most adorable thing: "Are you all right, little fella?"

Although the number of people in the world is far too large for [redacted] to grasp, I fully believe her when she says that she loves everyone in the world. Love comes easily to young children. It's much more natural than hate. [redacted], though, stands out with her huge capacity for caring and love and affection. One thing that I have been so struck by in my time with [redacted] is the amazing sponge-like quality of young children's minds and the way they take in everything they see and experience and reflect that back into the world. [redacted]'s bigheartedness is a tremendous affirmation of what a wonderful person EB is, for EB has been by far the largest influence on [redacted], and [redacted] would not have such a loving nature if she had not had a great example to follow.

We should all consider this when we spend time with children. It breaks my heart to think of the children who are growing up in households where a person who mocks the disabled, brags about grabbing women by the pussy, and dehumanizes immigrants (to name just a few items from a depressingly long list) is considered someone to be admired. Love comes more naturally to children than hate, but if they are inundated with demonstrations of hate, that's going to be hard to overcome. As much as we can, we need to demonstrate love and compassion to all the children we meet, whether they are our own or strangers. Every significant interaction with a child is a powerful opportunity to help shape what sort of person that child becomes.

Many travels, little rest

At the Travelers' Rest music festival I recently attended with EB in Missoula, Montana, I found myself pondering alternate realities.

If I had never met EB, I would likely have been at the festival by myself. I'm sure that I still would have had a great time. Going back much farther in time to another branch point between alternate realities, if Cara had never gotten cancer, there's a good chance I would have been at the festival with her.

It's interesting to think about these things, but I'm glad to say that the reality I inhabit is mostly a happy one.

When indie folk/rock band The Decemberists (whose lead singer Colin Meloy hails from Missoula) announced they were hosting a two-day music festival at the Big Sky Brewing Amphitheater in Montana's largest city, headlining both days and bringing in a great supporting lineup, it was an easy decision for me to go. I've been a Decemberists fan for many years. I had previously seen the band on four occasions, and each one was a very memorable experience. The first time I saw them was in October 2005 at the Odeon in Cleveland; I had just recently gotten into concertgoing and it was one of the most fun shows yet. The second came in November 2006 at the Agora in Cleveland. It was less than a week after I started dating Cara, and during the show, I called her when the band played "Red Right Ankle" so she could listen.

The third time I saw the Decemberists live was memorable for negative reasons. The April 23, 2011 show was on the indoor stage at the LC Pavilion in Columbus; Cara attended with me, but because the audience was so annoyingly chatty she got fed up and left halfway through the band's set. I didn't leave, but the chattiness put a big damper on the experience for me too. I remember well exiting the venue to find Cara waiting for me outside. I mentioned this experience, contrasting it to the much smaller but much more attentive audience at the Rural Alberta Advantage show I attended the next night, in a blog post. That RAA show was on April 24, 2011 - that is, exactly four years before Cara's death. It's so surreal to look back on things that occurred on those significant dates before they were significant dates.

I also reviewed the Decemberists show Cara and I attended at Nautica Pavilion in July of that year, the month after we got married. That was another very memorable show but in this case for a wonderful reason - the giant cargo ship that coincidentally floated down the Cuyahoga River behind the venue's stage in perfect timing with "The Mariner's Revenge Song" was surreal and awesome and left me giddy.

When I bought my ticket for Travelers' Rest (named for the nearby historic site where Lewis and Clark camped on their expedition), EB and I were already online friends, but were not yet dating. I'm delighted that things proceeded in the way they did, that I was able to procure a second ticket some time later via StubHub, and that the two of us were able to time our travels so that we met up at Midway Airport in Chicago on the evening of Friday, August 11 and then proceeded together to Spokane, Washington - the beginning of one of the most exciting weeks of my entire life.

The following day we drove to Missoula, stopping for lunch in the little town of Wallace, Idaho, where the annual Accordion Jubilee happened to be taking place, kicking off a wonderful weekend of musical festivities!

Montana is known as the Big Sky State, but as we drove on we noticed that the sky was not "big" at all; visibility was quite limited due to a thick haze created by recent forest fires in the area. When we arrived at the amphitheater, the sky was very strange. At times the sun, a bright orange circle, was visible through the haze, but other than that, the sky was all a monochrome gray, and none of the mountains that one would normally see from that vantage point were visible. It was like being enclosed in some sort of eerie dome, and I remarked to EB that I thought the atmosphere felt apocalyptic. Like outside of our little dome, the world could have ended and we wouldn't know.

Although of course our phones could be used to verify that the rest of the world was intact.

And of course current events, which many of the festival's artists gave brief mention to, also helped provide that apocalyptic flavor.

The festival was a nice way to escape - well, mostly escape - from that disturbing reality.

The Decemberists closed off the proceedings on both nights with absolutely stellar sets, repeating no songs between the two setlists. As a longtime fan of the band it was an absolute thrill, a wonderful selection of highlights from their large and varied catalog. Several of the songs ("Red Right Ankle" among them) recalled poignant memories of me and Cara. I became very emotional on multiple occasions, and was glad that I had EB there to lean on.

I was overjoyed when the band closed the first night with "The Tain," an epic (single track with five different movements in 18+ minutes) EP that they released in 2004. It's what one might call a "deep cut" from the band's catalog, not one that most casual fans would know. You see, at that show that Cara left early in disgust, the band opened the show with "The Tain," and Cara and I were initially excited, but quickly became exasperated and infuriated as most of the people around us loudly carried on with their conversations and made it nigh impossible for us to enjoy the band's performance. Now I was in an amphitheater full of true Decemberists fans and everyone was there to watch the band play. That makes the concertgoing experience so much better, and I thought of how thrilled Cara would have been to finally see "The Tain" performed in a proper environment.

On day two, an early to mid afternoon rain shower (very welcome in an area experiencing a drought) cleared out some of the haze. A brief heavier rainfall accompanied our arrival to the venue, but it quickly subsided, and weather conditions were quite nice for the rest of the day. I asked EB if she would be up for going to stand in the pit for some of the highlight performances, the Decemberists included (on the first night we stayed on the lawn). She was all for it. I have to say, it really drove home to me how much difference it makes to be up close and personal to performing artists. That's something I usually try to do at shows, but for some strange reason, I had always been rather far away from the stage at every previous Decemberists show I'd attended. The first night of Travelers' Rest was magical, but being close to the stage and surrounded by other fans who were as passionate as me took the second night to a whole nother joyous level. Best of all was the raucous encore, featuring "The Chimbley Sweep" and "The Mariner's Revenge Song" and taking me back to that very first Decemberists show I attended almost twelve years ago when the same two songs were performed in the encore!

Before playing the fan favorite "Mariner's Revenge Song," Colin Meloy always provides (undoubtedly familiar to most members of this particular audience) instructions that, at the appropriate time in the song, band member Chris Funk will give a signal, and then we audience members will all scream at the top of our lungs as if we are being devoured by a giant whale. And then, before the song begins, we practice. Funk holds his arms out and brings them together to mime a giant set of jaws closing. We all scream. This was old hat for me, but EB had never experienced it before. It was fun to see her have that experience.

As the band started up the jaunty intro to the epic revenge tune from their classic 2005 album Picaresque (my introduction to the band), I thought of all the previous times I'd seen the song performed. That included, in fact, every previous Decemberists concert I'd been to, except the previous night's. Best of all was that magical experience at my last Decemberists concert with Cara. Emotions surged inside me.

When the appropriate time came, EB and I joined in with the rest of the exuberant throng in a chorus of high-pitched screaming. And then the whale came out on stage.

(I was very in the moment and did not feel like taking my phone out for a picture; this is from another Decemberists show and I found it on a blog called I Just Read About That.)

EB reacted audibly in surprise and disbelief, and I loved her reaction, because I could remember oh those many years ago when I myself first laid eyes on a similar sight at my first Decemberists concert.

As the song reached its conclusion, the whale was actually crowdsurfed, adding a wonderful extra bit of whimsy to an already wonderful experience. All in all, it was quite easily one of the best concerts I've ever attended.

The trip to the festival would have been worth it for the two Decemberists performances alone, but the rest of the lineup provided several additional highlights. The secondary headlining artists (performing before the Decemberists on days one and two, respectively), The Head and the Heart and Belle and Sebastian, are two other bands whose music I've enjoyed for many years. Belle and Sebastian were meaningful not only to me and Cara but to EB and Todd as well. This was EB's first time seeing them live, and I was so happy she could have that experience. The Head and the Heart's performance made me very emotional in a way I hadn't anticipated, but it made sense. The only previous time I had seen them, they opened for the Decemberists at that spectacular last Decemberists show with Cara. I realized that I strongly associate the music from their first album with that summer of 2011, the summer when I got married, which was the happiest time in my life (now joined by the last few months!).

Julien Baker, the first main stage artist on day two, also gave a mesmerizing performance. Just one small woman by herself with her guitar, she was dwarfed by the huge stage on which she stood, but her powerful voice easily filled up the space. At one point between songs she remarked on how she was "so grateful" to be there. I shared the sentiment.

The Travelers' Rest festival was an experience I'm glad to say I'll always carry with me, but it was also just the beginning of an incredible week.

EB and I had been planning to find a hike to do on Monday somewhere between Missoula and Spokane (she was flying out of Spokane very early Tuesday morning), but on Sunday night EB suggested we make a day trip up to Glacier National Park, where she had been once with her family as a teenager. I was initially skeptical of the idea because of the huge amount of extra driving it would involve relative to the amount of time we'd be at the park, but she talked me into it, and I'm glad she did. We went on a great hike to Avalanche Lake. Early in the hike we passed a gorge with stunningly clear water rushing through picturesque rock walls that had been carved out and smoothed by the water over many millennia.

What awaited us at the end point of the out-and-back trail was far more stunning; in fact, I told EB it was "one of the most amazing things I've seen in my life."

This picture really doesn't do the sight justice, but it's the best I have. Something about the way those three thin waterfalls traversed their way down that massive rock face and the sheer scale of it all and the colors and the clear, cold water (which we couldn't resist "resting our toesies in" as EB and [redacted] like to say) was so captivating. We lingered there for some time as a cool, light rain fell onto the otherwise pristine lake surface and onto our heads. Once more, like at the festival, I felt very grateful to be there in that moment.

We returned to our rental car but did not yet begin the long drive to Spokane. Instead we continued farther into the park, along the unbelievably scenic "Going-to-the-Sun Road," retracing a route EB had traveled many years ago.

She told me that she liked traveling with me to places she had been before. I remarked that we had not yet traveled together to any places I had previously traveled - but then added that, although not a geographic location, going to a Decemberists concert had been like going to a place I had been before!

After reaching a visitor center by the continental divide, we got out, looked around, bought a couple of souvenirs for [redacted], and took stock of our situation. We had a long, long drive ahead of us. We would be reaching Spokane very late. I thought perhaps it had been crazy of us to attempt such a trip. Perhaps it was. But I'm glad we did it.

We reached Spokane after 11 pm (despite gaining an hour from the change in time zones) and EB's flight was at 6 am the next morning. (Hence the title of this blog post!) While EB would be flying back to Nashville, I had much more driving in store. Tuesday found me spending another 6 hours in the car as I drove to Mt. Rainier National Park to join my family. Several spectacular vistas along the way made the long drive anything but monotonous.

The last of these pictures is Mt. Rainier, the anchor point of the park that was my destination. I remember my jaw dropped at each of these sights. The American West really is full of awe-inspiring natural beauty in a way that is not quite true of the part of the country where I've lived my whole life (not that we don't have a lot of wonderful outdoors around here!).

More spectacular hiking awaited me at Rainier.

After a too short stay, my very busy visit to the Northwest concluded with a trip to Seattle to visit my friend Shelli Snyder who was struck by a car while riding her bicycle across the country last year and nearly died.

In fact, EB and I drove past the site of the crash, near Glacier National Park. A Bike Cleveland "Watch For Bikes, Save A Life" sign still stands next to the road there.

It was the first time I'd seen Shelli in several months and it was a very emotional visit. The fact that she survived and all the progress that she's made are wonderful. At the same time, I was deeply saddened at the very difficult reality she and her loved ones continue to face. And I felt newly infuriated at the person who had, in one careless moment, forever altered and nearly ended my friend's life.

When someone gets cancer, like Cara or Todd, it's often for reasons we can't fully understand or control. And we have to make the best of an awful situation, but we also know sometimes that's the way life is, and perhaps nothing could have been done to prevent it.

When a reckless driver strikes an innocent passerby like Shelli and nearly kills her, that's something that could very easily have been prevented if that driver had just been paying adequate attention to their surroundings. Such incidents happen all too often and only seem to be increasing in frequency. Operating a motor vehicle is an awesome responsibility and it's a responsibility that most people don't fully appreciate. A motor vehicle traveling at high speed is a deadly weapon. One careless moment can do irreversible damage. Please, please, please, make sure you do not take that awesome responsibility lightly, and speak up to influence those around you to do the same.

I spent the second half of Thursday and all of Friday with Shelli. Saturday found me catching a flight home to Cleveland that, although not as early as EB's Tuesday morning departure, was quite early itself. I didn't want to get home too late because I had a concert to go to that night - Michelle Branch at the Grog Shop. It was a concert I was very much looking forward to, as Michelle Branch's music is meaningful to me in ways that involve both Cara and EB. (I plan to write about this in an upcoming post.)

I was scheduled to fly through Minneapolis with an hour-and-a-half layover, but after my plane in Seattle taxied out to the runway, we were informed that there was a problem with one of the doors and we would be returning to the gate.

I cringed, remembering how the previous time I had been flying home to Cleveland with plans to see a concert that night, I had ended up missing the concert because of extreme flight delays.

It seemed to take forever, but finally we departed Seattle, and I was relieved to realize that I would be (just barely) making my next flight. As I exited the plane in Minneapolis, I was expecting to have to make a rushed journey through the terminal. I was not at all expecting what actually happened. Stepping off the plane and into the tunnel, I noticed a man in a suit holding a board with my and another passenger's names on it. He led us down a stairway, onto the tarmac - and toward a waiting Porsche, in which he drove us to our next plane!

What a way to cap off a week full of adventures.

The concert that night was great, but as I said, I'll cover that in another post.

Monday brought more excitement with the solar eclipse. It was thrilling to see the eclipse here in Cleveland, reminding me very much of the 1994 solar eclipse I saw as a child in Columbus. After seeing pictures from people who got to experience totality, though, I found myself wishing I had extended my travels through Monday to be able to see the total eclipse myself. (Even if it would have meant missing the Michelle Branch concert, because I'm sure I'll get another opportunity to see Michelle Branch before my next opportunity to see a total solar eclipse.) I had thought it would be too much traveling, with all the other traveling I've done not only last week but the rest of this summer. I now think (as my and EB's day trip to Glacier showed!) that there is rarely such thing as too much traveling when the traveling involves such wonderful adventures.

Fair and balanced?

I returned home yesterday from a wonderful week of vacation, but while I was away I could not help but to feel more and more troubled by events unfolding in our country. Most shocking was Donald Trump essentially taking a "both sides are to blame" stance after violence broke out at a white supremacist rally and a white supremacist drove his car into a crowd of counter-protesters, murdering a young woman.

That Donald Trump is a racist is a well-established fact (even Paul Ryan had to admit Trump had made the "textbook example of a racist comment" when Trump, last year, said that a judge's Mexican heritage made him unqualified to hear a case involving fraud at Trump University), but this was a new low. One would think that even if someone who sympathized with white supremacists managed to become president, they would keep those sympathies quiet. Trump is so far outside the bounds of normal that perhaps nothing should be considered shocking. Trump's attempt to blame both sides for the violence, though, highlights a problem plaguing modern political discourse. I'd describe it as the problem of false equivalency, or "both-sides-ism."

When there are two sides in a debate, it's easy to assume that the truth must be somewhere in the middle. Easy, and also intellectually lazy. Often the truth is nowhere near the middle. When you have a group of people marching in favor of white supremacy, and another group of people opposing them, there can never be a moral equivalency between those two groups, regardless of the exact details of how physical violence broke out. By waving Confederate and Nazi flags, white supremacists are implicitly calling for the violent subjugation of African-Americans and Jews. There is no such thing as a "peaceful" white supremacist demonstration.

The truth is not in the middle.

That's something that most people can see in this situation, but there are many other situations where the same principle applies. I've fallen into the both-sides-ism trap before. I remember in 2003 when massive protests occurred against the Bush administration's disastrous and immoral invasion of Iraq. One day, protesters blocked traffic at my school. I don't know for sure whether the war is justified, but on the other hand the protesters are kind of annoying, I thought. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. I cringe looking back on it, at what a naive idiot I was.

The both-sides-ism phenomenon is exemplified by the pervasive influence of the Fox News channel and its long-time "fair and balanced" slogan on our society.

It used to be that most Americans got their TV news from either NBC, CBS, or ABC, and everyone who consumed TV news was getting the same general information. There were large differences in political opinions, but most people mostly agreed on the basic facts of what was going on in the news. In the 1990s, media options began to diversify. Prominent right-wing media figures realized it would be greatly profitable if they could convince their consumers that all other media outlets were the "liberal media" and could not be trusted. And eventually we reached the point we're at today.

It's probably a safe assumption that very few if any readers of this blog entry are big Donald Trump fans. Thinking that Trump is a bad president, I'd contend, is something that does not require one to hold any particular set of political beliefs. Conservatives should abhor Trump just as much as liberals do. The man is utterly self-serving and incompetent at executing the duties of the presidency; even if you're a party-line Republican voter it shouldn't be hard to see that.

A national poll released by Suffolk University at the end of June revealed an incredibly striking phenomenon if one dug into the crosstabs: one of the questions asked was what source of TV news respondents considered most trustworthy. Of respondents who answered Fox News, Trump had an 89% approval rating. Of respondents who answered any other TV station, Trump had an 18% approval rating.

Saying that Donald Trump is doing a good job as president is a claim I'd consider to be on a similar level as saying that the sun revolves around the Earth. It's just not supportable. For a long time, many people have contended that Fox News is a dedicated propaganda outlet that convinces its viewers to believe falsehoods. The results of this survey are the best evidence I've seen to support this notion.  There truly are two Americas. There's the America of Fox News viewers, and there's the America of everyone else. Only one of those two groups of people is inhabiting something that resembles reality.

And yet, even if political moderates (who largely disapprove of Trump) recognize that Fox News has a heavy right-wing bias, Fox News has still succeeded in poisoning the well when it comes to how those moderates view the political debate. Because people tend to think that the truth is in the middle. So they think there's the Fox News side, and there's the "liberal media" side, and the truth is in the middle.

The truth doesn't have to be in the middle. Whatever the biases of other mainstream media sources (biases, I might add, that can go in many directions), they aren't dedicated propaganda outlets. Fox News is.

Let me remind you again that 89% of Fox News viewers approve of the job Donald Trump is doing as president. It's hard to fathom of what sort of garbage would have to go into someone's mind for "Donald Trump = good president" to come out.

Furthermore, both-sides-ism has come to plague the non-Fox media - Trump was the most unqualified and scandal-ridden candidate in history, so mainstream media sources, not wanting to appear "biased," made Hillary Clinton's single (and utterly benign in comparison) scandal over her email servers the most covered story of the campaign, and thus helped Trump win.

If there are two sides to a debate, and one side is the Fox News side, you're more likely to arrive at the correct outcome if you disregard the Fox News side than if you assume the truth is in the middle. This applies to almost every issue, not just the question of whether Donald Trump is doing a good job. (Is Black Lives Matter a "hate group"? No, it's not. Is human-caused climate change a problem? Yes, it is. Are tax cuts for the wealthy good economic stimulus? No, they aren't. These are all questions that have correct answers. The truth is not in the middle.)

This media polarization is going to continue to be a big problem going forward. Solving the problem is much trickier than identifying the problem. Hopefully having to suffer through the shame of having an unabashed racist in the Oval Office will at least help more people wake up to the problem. In the short term, to mitigate the damage we're going to have to keep pressure up on our other elected officials and we're going to have to turn out in massive numbers in the 2018 election.

Recognize the both-sides-ism trap when you or others may be falling into it. And don't stay silent in the face of hatred. None of us can afford that now.

Life is what happens while we're making plans

As I sit in a seaside condo on Florida's Gulf Coast where I've joined EB and [redacted] for their annual beach getaway, I continue to marvel at all the remarkable events that have unfolded this year.

Not the least of which, the eight-day period from Thursday, July 20 through Thursday, July 27 contained within it three of the most meaningful concert experiences of my entire life.

The first of the three was the tenth(!!) time that I've seen my favorite band Okkervil River perform live, but this one was the most special of them all. I remember well how ecstatic I was when the announcement was made that Will Sheff's band would be embarking on a very limited "rarities and requests" tour, performing in intimate settings as an acoustic trio, and one stop on the tour would be in Columbus, Ohio at the Rumba Cafe. I have written many, many times about the significance of Okkervil River to my and Cara's relationship so I won't rehash too much of that here. But it's important to note that my previous time seeing them, last October in Pittsburgh, was the first time I ever got to talk to Will Sheff, and I told him there about Cara and about how we had seen Okkervil River together in Columbus both shortly before we started dating and also, in an amazing coincidence, on the night before our wedding.

The way the rarities and requests tour worked was that Will asked people to post their requests on the Facebook event pages for each particular show so that he could create setlists composed of those requests. My message, far more personal than those most other people posted, went as follows:

I would be absolutely thrilled to hear "Seas Too Far To Reach." Many years ago when I had recently started dating my (late) wife I was super into the album Down the River of Golden Dreams and that song in particular makes me think of those times - I actually put it on a mixtape for her three months after we started dating. Also "Listening to Otis Redding at Home During Christmas" would be wonderful; I have a thing for songs that evoke feelings of nostalgia and that's one of the best.

Will started out the show by himself with his acoustic guitar, then over the next two songs brought out, one by one, the upright bassist and lead guitarist who rounded out this incarnation of Okkervil River as a trio. At the beginning of each song, Will said, "This is for..." followed by the name of a person who had requested that particular song on Facebook. "Listening to Otis Redding..." appeared early in the show, but dedicated to someone else who had requested it, not to me. It was the first time I had ever seen the song performed and it was utterly magical. The lyrics about returning to one's childhood home at Christmas time and thinking about your past, and about the future you once thought you might have, are so evocative and strike such a chord with me, even more now than when I first fell in love with the song.

The whole concert was a magical experience. I was also overjoyed to hear "The Velocity of Saul at the Time of His Conversion," another first-time live experience for me and another of my favorite songs from Down the River of Golden Dreams.

As the show continued, my hopes and expectations that I would hear "Seas Too Far To Reach" and that it would be dedicated to me grew. And then Will, his voice quavering with emotion, said, "This is a very special request for Jeff McManus." My parents, who I asked to go to the show with me not because they're Okkervil River fans (they haven't listened to the band much) but rather because I wanted them to be able to share what was likely to be a very moving experience with great personal meaning, both reached out to touch me. And then I was plunged into one of the most emotional musical experiences of my life. The whole time I thought of Cara and was filled with an incredible nostalgic mixture of joy and sorrow.

All in all, the Okkervil River rarities and requests show was probably the single most meaningful concert experience of my life. After the show I again got to talk with Will Sheff, more briefly this time. I was delighted when I overheard the young man talking to him immediately before me say, "Thank you so much for playing 'Seas Too Far To Reach'" and explain how meaningful the song was to him as well.

When it was my turn, I began to say, "I also wanted to thank you for playing that song."

"You're Jeff, right?" Will interrupted.

He remembered me, I thought, awed. WILL SHEFF remembered who I was, without me even reminding him! I was nearly as moved then as at the playing of my requested song. The fact that I, by sharing with him my and Cara's story and the impact he had had on my life, had in turn clearly had an impact on his life - on one of my most admired people in the whole world - was so powerful.

I also told Will that I thought he'd like to know I had found love again, and he seemed genuinely extremely grateful that I had shared the news with him.

It was an incredible experience. And it was just the beginning.

One funny little anecdote from the Okkervil River show - after the band played "The Next Four Months" (a song about drug use) my dad remarked, "That was pretty depressing." Silently, I laughed, thinking in particular of how Cara would have reacted, and how she had enjoyed over the years recounting the story of my dad going with my sister to an Andrew Bird concert Cara and I also attended and afterwards saying, "I liked some of that, but some of it was just noise."

Which brings me to the second of the three concerts for this post. On Tuesday, July 25, Cara's mother Joyce came up from Columbus and joined me in seeing Andrew Bird perform at Cain Park not far from my house in Cleveland Heights. This was oh so special for multiple reasons. Andrew Bird was Cara's favorite musician. We saw him together four times (Cara wrote a wonderful review of one of those shows). Joyce has an iPod we gave her with lots of our favorite music on it, so she's listened to a lot of Andrew Bird and knows how much meaning that music had to Cara, her only child. Last year I tried to get Joyce to come up to Cleveland for an Andrew Bird show but she decided she wasn't up for the trip. This time she decided to go for it, and for the first time since Cara's death she came up to Cleveland to see me. Making the occasion even more notable, July 25 was the second anniversary of Joyce's mother's death.

Bird put on a stellar performance as usual. His wizardry with his violin and loop pedals and his astounding talent for whistling have to be experienced in person to be believed. I was thrilled when he played "Why," for I remembered well the passionate feelings Cara had described that song evoking in her. Cain Park was a beautiful setting with perfect weather for an outdoor show.

The final song of the night was "Tables and Chairs," a whimsical number about societal collapse. Before playing the song, from 2005's Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs, Bird remarked that it was interesting when old songs you had written years ago took on new meaning, and said that he would be changing some of the lyrics. Among them, he changed the line "Don't you worry about the atmosphere" to say that he is worried about the atmosphere.

Sobering.

But it was another magical night. Joyce was so grateful to me for having her up to visit and for taking her to the concert, which she said she enjoyed very, very much, and also that she was thinking of both her mother and Cara the whole time.

While the Okkervil River rarities and requests show was probably my most meaningful concert experience and going to see Andrew Bird with my mother-in-law was also up there, the final show of the three, Piebald at the Grog Shop this past Thursday, was quite simply one of the most fun concerts I've ever attended.

The Okkervil River and Piebald shows were announced quite close to each other, early this year, and both announcements made me similarly amazed and excited. Piebald was the first band I ever saw perform at the Grog Shop, one of my favorite local concert venues. That show was in October 2005, shortly after I had gotten into going to live shows. It was an unforgettable experience. I saw Piebald several more times over the next two years, but then they broke up in 2007. After that I never expected I'd ever get to enjoy one of their live shows again.

Last year, the band regrouped; somehow I missed the news until the Grog Shop show was announced. And then I could hardly wait for the chance to relive some of the most fun times of my young adulthood.

Piebald's music is high energy, emo-tinged rock with witty lyrics you can't resist belting out together with lead singer Travis Shettel and a room full of other excited fans. (With a few appropriately timed fist pumps thrown in for good measure!) The band also played a brief acoustic set that afternoon at Wax Bodega, a record store in Lakewood, which I left work for a little while to see because when else would I ever get that opportunity? Between that rather laid back acoustic performance and the raucous powerhouse of a performance that followed it that night, the band played all twelve songs from their classic 2002 album We Are the Only Friends We Have, delighting me and the rest of the audience. Cara liked Piebald too, although she never saw them live. I have a memory of her choosing that album to play in the car on an early morning drive to a cycling event. It's great pump-up music. Piebald also played quite a few of the best songs from 1999's If It Weren't for Venetian Blinds, It Would Be Curtains for Us All, mostly eschewing the rest of their catalog. At both the Okkervil River and Piebald shows it was such a wonderful experience to be in a small room full of people who were long-time fans like me, with similar appreciation and enthusiasm for the music being performed for us. At the quieter Okkervil River show, this mostly manifested in enthusiastic applause and whoops after songs and astonished exclamations at the revelation of each rarity within the setlist. At the Piebald show the atmosphere was more that of a party, everyone moving to the music and screaming out those familiar choruses. Each experience was special and wonderful in its own way.

Piebald has a lot of music that can thematically be summed up as saying "life is too short so enjoy it while you can." I fondly remember rocking out to their song "Still We Let It Choke Us" as a twenty-two year old enjoying my first Grog Shop experience. Today, at thirty-four, and appropriately enough enjoying a beach vacation as I write this, the lyrics still resonate:

Well, life is a bitch
And life is a beach
You've got the sun and the sand and your suit all within your reach
Take off the tie
What a sick day
We've gone to build castles in sand and go swimming,
It's time for our play
To the barricades
We'll take them by storm
Days fade to weeks, fade to months, fade to years
And there's not that much more. [note: this is followed by a blistering guitar solo of an outro]

It was fun to feel "young again" for a night, but I wouldn't trade the life I have now for the one I had then!

Of cats and kids

As EB, [redacted], and I drove to the Shaker Square Farmer's Market on Saturday morning one of the sweetest and most touching things ever happened.

Two weeks before, during [redacted]'s first and EB's second visit to Cleveland, I had mentioned to them something that Cara had often said to our two cats Mitters and Eponine to try to discourage them from the altercations they frequently got into: "No fights, and no bites." (Today I also have two cats. Eponine remains one of them, but the older Mitters passed away three months ago. Last fall I adopted a very rambunctious kitten who I named Gavroche, now a still very rambunctious one-year-old. So clashes between cats remain an issue in my household.) I didn't place any special emphasis on the story; it was just a nice little anecdote that seemed relevant when I brought it up. So I was astonished and moved nearly to tears when, out of the blue, two weeks later, [redacted] said, "Hey remember that thing Cara used to say? No fights, and no... scratch?"

At four years old, [redacted] would undoubtedly have no way of fully comprehending just how touched I was by what she had just said, but EB understood perfectly, and I exchanged knowing looks with her. "That's really close," I told [redacted]. "It was actually 'no fights, and no bites.'"And I delved into a brief explanation of how it was a funny phrase because the words "fights" and "bites" rhyme with each other - rhyming words being a concept in which [redacted] has recently taken interest.

[redacted] took this to heart, and later that day she was repeatedly heard to exclaim, "Gavvy [Gavroche's nickname], no fights, and no bites!"

Seeing [redacted] and my two cats become acquainted with each other has been a very interesting experience. EB and [redacted] have a dog named Beazy and used to have a cat, originally EB's husband Todd's cat, named Firenze, but like [redacted]'s daddy, her kitty cat passed away when she was a baby. She once told me that she hopes they can get another kitty some day. I smiled at this.

My cats, on the other hand, had no prior experience with a child of [redacted]'s age.

(Above: Eponine. Below: Gavroche. Both these pictures were taken less than an hour after Mitters passed away. I was in a very sentimental mood.)

Eponine is one of the nicest and most sociable cats I have ever known, and as far as I can remember has always wanted to be friends with every person she has met. But she had never before met a wild four-year-old. On [redacted]'s first visit to Cleveland, [redacted] very quickly and enthusiastically approached Eponine - and Eponine was terrified. For the whole rest of that weekend, Eponine acted nothing like her normal self. All cats have their typical spots where they like to hang out. That weekend, Eponine mostly abandoned her normal spots, instead opting for other locations that would decrease her visibility.

Gavvy, on the other hand, knows little fear. The little guy reacted in a quite different way to being startled. I came home from work on that first Friday to hear that Gavvy had bitten [redacted]. I asked if [redacted] had done anything before he bit her, to which she answered no. EB, on the other hand, explained that [redacted] had sat down next to Gavvy and had then, inadvertently but quite suddenly, brushed against him, to which Gavvy had reacted by swiping at [redacted]. (It was a scratch, not a bite, EB believed - and only a very minor scratch; fortunately I had trimmed Gavvy's claws the day before.)

We explained to [redacted] that kitty cats should be handled with care - even friendly cats like Eponine and Gavvy don't like it if you approach them in a sudden and unpredictable manner.

By the end of that first weekend, [redacted] had improved in her behavior around the cats. Eponine was still quite frightened of this strange new creature who had invaded her domain, but she quickly got over it after EB and [redacted]'s departure.

On [redacted]'s just concluded second visit to Cleveland, things between her and the cats went much, much better. As EB and I like to say, "Like sea slugs, we are capable of learning." ("We," in this case, could refer to both humans and felines.) [redacted] knew to approach the cats slowly and purposefully rather than rapidly and unpredictably. This time around, Eponine showed no signs of the terror she had expressed two weeks ago. She even let [redacted] pet her with no other humans in the immediate vicinity, and clearly enjoyed it. [redacted] was quite proud of her accomplishment.

While Eponine's fear of [redacted] mostly disappeared, [redacted]'s fear of Gavvy was still present, but she's learning how to behave around the little fellow to avoid his scratches (none of which occurred this time, although there were several times [redacted] thought Gavvy was about to scratch her), and even called Gavvy a "sweet kitty" (echoing EB's description) when I held Gavvy and let [redacted] give him a goodbye pet.

Amusingly, [redacted] seems to default to thinking of cats as girls, and despite our many, many corrections, still usually refers to Gavvy with feminine pronouns.

Another amusing incident occurred the other day when I, from another room, heard a frightened shriek from [redacted] and quickly entered the dining room to investigate. [redacted] and Gavvy were standing a few feet apart from each other in a little standoff. But [redacted]'s fear quickly turned to excitement. "Gavvy jumped at me like a hero!" she exclaimed, laughing. And after this, [redacted] decided she wanted to be like Gavvy and "jump like a hero" herself. For the rest of the visit, she performed many such "hero jumps" (which to her meant jumping off of a chair to the floor) herself.

What a sweet, sweet girl. Perhaps some day in the future I'll try to explain to her how much it meant to me when she brought up that story about Cara and then imitated Cara's spoken instructions to a cat. [redacted] is definitely wise beyond her years. I think even now she'd have some capacity for understanding the importance, but I'll wait. I'm sure it's a memory that will always stick with me.

And now a few more adorable stories about [redacted] from this visit that aren't related to cats but are very much worth sharing.

The three of us went to the Stone Oven bakery near my house most days of the visit. [redacted] has developed a thing for the bakery's dinosaur cookies. On one morning she said that she wanted a green dinosaur cookie and told the girl behind the counter this, but then said she had changed her mind and actually wanted a yellow dinosaur cookie. On the walk back to my house [redacted] explained her reasoning. "I remembered that yellow used to be one of my favorite colors, so I thought I'd like to have that cookie." Apparently four-year-olds can be influenced by feelings of nostalgia!

At the farmer's market, on a wet morning following a night of heavy rainfall, [redacted] discovered that she enjoyed standing under trees and shaking low hanging branches to give herself little "showers." She'd stand under a tree for several minutes doing this until EB told her it was time to move on, after which [redacted] would tell us she had to go find the next shower. Her hair was quite wet by the end of our visit to the market. [redacted] provided a great deal of entertainment to several of the market vendors that morning.

On Saturday night we had my friend Jessiye over for dinner, as well as a delicious holiday-themed blueberry pie that [redacted] helped me make using fresh berries from the market.

After dinner EB and Jessiye were talking and [redacted] and I were coloring with crayons. [redacted] decided that we were going to draw dinosaurs and frogs, so we did. After completing some drawings, I remarked (very truthfully) that I was much better at drawing dinosaurs than I was at drawing frogs.

"Am I much better at drawing frogs than drawing dinosaurs?" [redacted] asked.

"It looks like you're pretty good at both," I replied.

[redacted] pondered this for a moment, then produced a priceless response. "I'm good at things."

No argument here!

The wonderful mind of a child, or, "A drink that is orange"

The mind of a four-year-old is one of the most fascinating things there is.

A newborn baby, as much as he or she is beloved by the parents and other relatives, is not someone with whom you can have a conversation. A newborn responds to stimuli in a similar way to how lesser animals respond to stimuli, and likely has little ability to engage in abstract thought. Somehow, over the next few years, an incredible developmental process occurs, integrating both intrinsic biological cues and extrinsic cues from the people and things in the environment and from all the human culture that has developed over the millennia, and that newborn's relatively simple mind turns into something that is capable of a vast array of very complex thought processes.

One of the most incredible parts? None of us really knows what that developmental process is like, because none of us can remember it.

I will soon be 34 years old. As the years go by, the memories of my past become increasingly distorted and imperfect, but I can still remember quite well what it was like to be, say, an 18-year-old. I remember less well, but still fairly well, what it was like to be a ten-year-old. A six-year-old? That's very hazy, but I still have some idea. But what it's like to be inside the mind of a four-year-old is something I have absolutely no idea about, and the same is true for almost everyone. That doesn't prevent us from recognizing as we interact with four-year-old children, especially with particularly smart four-year-old children, that there are truly amazing things going on inside those little minds. Which is why I've come to view the inner workings of the minds of small children as one of life's great mysteries.

Over Memorial Day weekend I visited EB in Nashville for the second time, and for the first time EB's daughter [redacted] spent almost the whole weekend with us, as opposed to very limited chunks during my previous visit. [redacted] is an incredibly bright four-year-old and I was constantly filled with a sense of joy and wonder by my interactions with her.

Here's a picture of the two of us waiting in line at Hattie B's, a restaurant known for Nashville's famous hot chicken.

[redacted]

The best of friends, right? It's oh so hard to believe that just four weeks prior, on my first visit to Nashville, we had been at the exact same spot and poor little [redacted], having just met me in person, had been cowering behind her mother's legs and talking about how "Jeffy" was "mean" because I had tried to bite her eyes(!!). When prodded by EB to acknowledge something nice I had done, [redacted] admitted that it had been nice of me to return EB's keychain to her. (I have no idea where she got these ideas about biting eyes and returning keychains!)

[redacted] quickly warmed up to me (Skype helped - hooray for technology!) and on this visit was eager to spend time with me. The three of us had a fabulous weekend. Here are some more anecdotes about [redacted]'s precious and fascinating behavior.

On Saturday morning we went to [redacted]'s T-ball game. In this version of T-ball, the players have a few chances to hit a real pitch thrown by their coach before the tee is brought out. [redacted] had never previously gotten a hit from a real pitch. On this morning, she did - not just once, but on both of her at-bats! This was a source of tremendous excitement for us all. Later, while walking to brunch from T-ball, [redacted] told us how we should tell her aunts and cousins about her amazing feat. "They would like be [she says "like be" rather than "be like" - adorable], '[redacted] couldn't do that!'" she said. "And we'll like be, 'she sure did!'"

Also that morning, [redacted] was being quite stubborn at points on our walks to the neighborhood grocery store and the T-ball game, risking losing her privilege to have an orange soda at brunch. (Spending the whole weekend with her, I got to be exposed to much of the full range of four-year-old behavior. It was a good learning experience.) When told by EB that EB didn't want to hear anything more about orange soda, [redacted] quickly shifted to asking if she'd be able to have "a drink that is orange." Ah, logic!

There was a very touching moment when [redacted] asked me why I was wearing a ring. I explained that it was my wedding ring. She asked if it had always been there. I told her no, it used to be on my left hand (one year and one day after Cara's death, I moved it my right hand ring finger). She asked why I moved it, and I said that when you have a ring on your left hand, it's a sign that you're married and therefore not looking for a girlfriend, and some time after Cara died I decided that I did want to look for a new girlfriend. "And then I met your mommy," I concluded.

[redacted] followed this up by asking how EB and I did meet, a question that EB tackled, jumping into an explanation about how there are Facebook groups for people with various interests.

How does a four-year-old grapple with the fact that her daddy died when she was just one, and she'll never know him except through stories and pictures and videos? But we humans are very good at adapting to different circumstances. For her, that's just the normal way that life is.

The very best part of the weekend was the hiking the three of us did. We went on beautiful hikes on both Sunday and Monday. Monday's was especially wonderful. Early in the hike, little [redacted] took off running along the trail. She quickly built up a significant lead on her mother and me. I decided, why not, I should start running with her. So I caught up to her and the two of us sped through the woods together, [redacted] in the lead.

It was about the most amazing feeling in the world.

Periodically, [redacted] would stop and look back along the trail, peering through the trees until she spotted EB walking behind us. "Let's start running again!" she would cry. The hike was four miles long, and I was astonished at the fact that [redacted], just four years old, was actually running for the majority of the first two miles. After this, she took several little spills and wanted to be carried by EB for a while in her carrier. But falling down did not do much to dampen her enthusiasm for the outing. She's a remarkably resilient little girl, and after most of the falls was eager to get right back up and keep going. "I'm okay, I'm okay!" she exclaimed to EB. "It was the root's fault!"

Our trail running time was also opportunity for more interesting conversations. At one point, [redacted] was telling me about something EB had told her, and I said, "Well, that's probably true, because your mommy is pretty smart."

I was taken aback by [redacted]'s response. "But I'm smarter, right?" And she went on to explain how she always gets things right in school, etc.

I had to ponder for a moment how to reply to that one! "Well, I think actually you're both really smart, and it would be hard to say who's smarter," I eventually said, which seemed to satisfy her, but who knows what she was really thinking when I told her that?

EB has been marveling for some time at the amazing things [redacted] says and does, and now I get to as well. I asked my mom if, when I was that age, she and my dad found themselves marveling at how smart I was. She said yes, definitely, but that she didn't have specific stories to tell. I guess that's part of the reason for EB and me to do this sort of writing - so that we will have specific stories! I'm sure you'll all be hearing more about the adventures of EB, [redacted], and Jeff in the months and years to come.