The Rose on the Table

These pages often fill with nonsensical opinions about current events. They please some while rubbing many the wrong way, including their author.

He’d advise no one to take his words too seriously. They’re merely ramblings of some numbskull with a Substack.

This writer’s experience is limited. Like most of us, he doubts little yet knows nothing. Most of his “news” is filtered thru screens and can’t be trusted. Just like what you’re reading now.

Despite the tone with which I occasionally write, I’m generally optimistic. In some sense, I have no choice.

With a lovely wife and two wonderful sons, how could I not have hope for the future? If I didn’t, what would be the point?

But it’s more than that. It’s easy to think things have never been so bad. It’s also preposterous… and hubristic. Who are we to bemoan our lot? Few in history have had it so good.

As never before in the annals of man, our era luxuriates in leisure. Capital bears most of the burden labor once shouldered, freeing minds to scroll feeds, “like” posts, or create “content.”

And, occasionally, to devise inventions that were recently unimaginable… and still are. Much of our seed-corn accumulated over centuries, allowing recent generations to reap the harvest while taking the bounty for granted.

The Fuel of Life

But material blessings we were bequeathed didn’t happen by accident. They required sound money that lengthened horizons, encouraged saving, and nourished investment that facilitated innovation.

As industry thrived, it demanded and enabled more robust sources of reliable power. Solar energy came out of the earth… first from coal, especially from oil, and later from natural gas.

Despite their detractors, these hydrocarbons sustain our lives. They’re the fuel that enables the food, mining, medicine, and mobility that undergird our modern existence. Because of them, most of us are shielded from the wrath of the weather, and rarely worry about our next meal.

Only recently has that been “normal”.

“Fossil fuels” facilitated improvements in sanitation and hygiene that rendered many once-lethal illnesses obsolete. And they propelled medical advances that mitigate most of the maladies that still persist.

Not everyone is so fortunate to share in these blessings, and there’ll always be those who won’t be. But poverty afflicts fewer people than ever in history, and the decline has accelerated exponentially since the late-19th century, when oil transitioned from annoying goo to industrial fuel:

But problems persevere, and always will.

Spiritual voids, family breakdown, rampant nihilism, and lack of community are considerable challenges rotting the West. Religion is waning, the money is fake, and politics are a scourge.

But what else is new?

Only this: tho’ much has been squandered on worthless “programs”, reckless wars, and duplicitous scams, some of our seed corn is still here. Notwithstanding the obstacles we bemoan, modern technological, financial, and medical resources remain unmatched.

We can communicate instantaneously with almost anyone in the world. At a moment’s notice and (relatively) minimal cost, we can go almost anywhere we want and be there within a day. Technology is advancing in ways that would’ve seemed like magic only a decade ago.

Gateway Drugs

Regardless surface chop, the prevailing current proceeds apace. Tides wax and wane, storms disrupt the prevailing offshore breeze, and occasional undertows pull us down. We seem to be struggling to overcome one now.

But the human spirit usually finds ways to keep its head above water. To avoid drowning, it finds strength to swim. It’ll do so again. In many ways, it already is.

We mustn’t be bogged down by remote menaces or imaginary threats. As Thomas Jefferson once wondered, “How much pain have cost us the evils which have never happened?”

It’s worthwhile to occasionally recall whether what we feared six months ago ever came to pass. Or six months before that. Or before that.

More often than not, the answer is “no”. Not that we shouldn’t anticipate and prepare. Because something hasn’t happened doesn’t mean it never will.

But we mustn’t sacrifice fulfillment to misplaced panic. As we’ve learned the last few decades, fears are like gateway drugs…give in to a small one, and before long you cave to larger ones.

Nerves are healthy if they motivate, but not when they cripple. Caution can be warranted if not taken to extremes. We mustn’t be so frightened of wandering the world that we fear tending our gardens.

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