Pistis reclaims 'excess deaths' (weekending January 30th 2021)

 

‽istis reclaims ‘excess deaths’ (weekending January 30^th  2021)

So, in the week it is reported to the World Health Organization that:

·        Globally, as of 4:35pm CET, 27 January 2021, there have been 99,864,391 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 2,149,700 deaths[i]

·        Americas: 1,015,534 deaths including 417,889 deaths in the USA

·        Europe: 722,746 deaths including 100,162 deaths in the UK

·        South East Asia: 195,762 deaths

·        China: 4,816 deaths

·        Eastern Mediterranean: 132,166 deaths

·        Africa: 59,677 deaths

·        Western Pacific: 23,808 deaths

…‽istis takes another look at population, births and deaths figures clocking up[ii] - to find that at 11:12 GMT on 29.1.2021 (the time and date of typing) the total deaths across the world already today are calculated to be 75,276 with the top ten causes[iii] apparently: ischaemic heart disease; stroke; chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; lower respiratory infection; neonatal conditions; trachea, bronchial and lung cancer; Alzheimer and other dementias; diarrhoeal disease and kidney disease. 

And ‽istis finds that the two leading causes of death in low-income countries are neonatal conditions and lower respiratory infections; that in upper-middle-income countries the two leading causes are ischaemic heart disease and stroke – and hints are perhaps given to the way that health outcomes may link to inequalities…  

And when Holocaust Memorial Day[iv] falls in this week, ‽istis is brought up short and overwhelmingly shocked again at the reminder: six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, and millions of people killed under Nazi persecution: ‘Roma and Sinti people (sometimes referred to as ‘Gypsies’) and black people. Slavic people, such as those from Poland and Russia, were considered inferior and were targeted because they lived in areas needed for German expansion. The Nazis wanted to ‘improve’ the genetic make-up of the population and so persecuted people they deemed to be disabled, either mentally or physically, as well as gay people. Political opponents, primarily communists, trade unionists and social democrats, as well as those whose religious beliefs conflicted with Nazi ideology…’ [v]

And ‽istis reads this paragraph again, slowly, thoughtfully and considers the scope and the scale and the horror. And ‽istis  thinks also about the people who continue to live with the shadow ever-present. And ‽istis is silent…

And so ‽istis ponders deaths: ‘excess’; inflicted, deliberate, systematized, apparently somehow supported by some belief or ideology; transmitted; preventable; accidental; because doing all that we could was just not good enough; before one’s time; ‘natural’… Lives lived on larger or smaller stages; with greater or lesser impact for good or ill; lived more or less to the full; lived as part of families, communities and networks…

So, ‽istis turns from death to wonder about different foundations for living and what might be their impact:

·        perhaps simply living in the ‘here and now’?

·        possibly living with a hope and belief in a future ‘then and there’ (and even maybe with the manner of this current living determining the where and the what-like)?

Or perhaps, possibly, maybe there are firmer foundations to be imagined or re-imagined; to be claimed or reclaimed; to be laid or re-laid – to provide the basis for anyone’s and everyone’s here-after… 

‽istis ponders on‽

© Pistis                                                                                                                       

NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme and past blog
entries to be found on Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’: @Pistis_wonders 

---

[i] https://covid19.who.int/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIkLeno7a-7gIVIu_tCh1h8g7HEAAYAiAAEgJwRvD_BwE (accessed 28012021 10:45 GMT 00:00)

[ii] https://www.worldometers.info/

[iii] https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/the-top-10-causes-of-death

[iv] https://www.hmd.org.uk/

[v] Ibid

 

Pistis reclaims the passing of time (weekending January 23rd 2021)

 

‽istis reclaims the passing of time (weekending January 23^rd 2021)

‽istis reclaims the passing of time as many people seem to be reflecting on perceptions over this past year: flashing past in extreme busyness and anxiety, shift after shift after shift after shift; dragging by in lockdown, without the usual routines, the work, the activities, the contact.

And ‽istis recalls a radio conversation this week (Adrian Chiles with Nobel-prize-winning physicist Sir Roger Penrose, R5Live, UK?) and snatches of the conversation come back: Einstein and e=mc², perhaps two hours like a minute, a minute like two hours?; Planck and e=hf; possibly relativity and constancy? the markers of hours and days and weeks, maybe fuzzy? physics and feelings, pheelings and fysics seeming to blur – melded ways of thinking, feeling and making sense of the world and our experiences?

So ‽istis wonders whether it might indeed all be relative: one thing compared with another, one perspective compared with another, one way of thinking about the world compared with another – but also the connectedness and relationship of objects, all living things, all people…

And just imagine how different the world could be if, in theory and practice, we hypothesised, sought, experimented and discovered new ways to connect and relate: the me and you, the ‘us’ and ‘them’, the ‘we’? The nobelest (sic) pursuit? Perhaps, possibly, maybe making prize-winners of us all?

© Pistis                                                                                                                       

NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme and past blog
entries to be found on Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’: @Pistis_wonders 

Pistis tries to reclaim 'now' (weekending January 16th 2021)

 

‽istis tries to reclaim 'now' (weekending January 16^th 2021)

‽istis sits with one confused and going, gently (though many not so gently rage) - and tries to reclaim ‘now’, but perhaps, possibly, maybe only just manages ‘then’ and ‘not yet’…

‘Then’: when we gathered and hugged, and worked, and partied, and travelled on trains and buses and planes, and sang, and cheered and chanted, and dined and drank, and painted, and read, and played, and familied, and sat and watched, and learned and taught, and worshipped and prayed, and walked, and visited, and just did nothing – together - and thought nothing of it…

‘Not yet’: looking forward to a future: perhaps more, possibly better, maybe together again…

And ‘now’ we wait, despite, with hope…

© Pistis                                                                                                                       

NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme and past blog
entries to be found on Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’:  @Pistis_wonders

Pistis reclaims legacy (weekending January 9th 2021)

 

‽istis reclaims legacy (weekending January 9^th 2021)

As Senator Chuck Schumer proclaims: “the final, terrible, indelible legacy of the 45^th president of the US, undoubtedly our worst”[i], ‽istis ponders legacy and the potential recall and possible deserved or undeserved snappy titles of future constructed histories:

‽ Catherine the Great, Edward the Confessor, Ivan the Terrible, Charles the Bald, Thorkell the Tall, Charles the Affable, Julian the Apostate, William the Ambitious, Indulf the Aggressor, Afonso the African, John the Beer-Jug, Isabel the Redemptress, Colomon the Bookish, Ivailo the Cabbage, Boleslaw the Chaste,  Uroš the Weak, Kenneth the Chief, John the Constant, Edmund the Deed-Doer, Vlad the Devil, Constantine the Dung-Named, Ivan the Fair, Niall the Showers, Louis the Unavoidable, Denis the Farmer, Ketil the Flatnose, Maria the Most-Beautiful, Rupert the Gentle, Wilfred the Hairy, Fulk the Ill-tempered, Henry the Impotent, Bayezid the Just, Leonor the Treacherous, George the Prince of Whales, Magnus the Law-Mender, Diodotus the Saviour, Eystein the Maiden, Charles the Martyr, Ivan the Moneybags, James the Wisest Fool in Christendom, Basarab the Young, Pippin the Younger, Sigurd the Mouth, Boso the Old, Alfonso the Peacemaker, Louis the Sluggard, Sancho the Populator, Ladislaus the Posthumous, Olaf the Quiet, Ethelred the Unready, Maria the Good Mother[ii]; on, on and gloriously on…

‽  Trump the Loser? (306 – 232[iii]), Trump the Useful Idiot? (possibly the best of UIs: for both Republicans 2016-2020 and for Democrats 2021 onwards with the Presidency, the Senate and the House?), Trump the Inciter? Trump the Double-Impeached? Trump the Patient? Trump the Inmate? Trump the Tweeter? Trump the TV Personality? Trump the Debtor?[iv], Trump the Bankrupt? Trump the Forgotten?      

And around the world you might like to complete the format on Twitter and other social media?

·        Country:.…….  Leader’s name………. the……….

      Fictitious examples for illustrative purposes only:

·        New Zealand: Jacinda Kate Laurell Ardern the Role Model?

·        United Kingdom: Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson the Hubristic?

And so ‽istis wonders how they and you and me might be remembered…? And if we were to ponder that now, how different the world might be?

© Pistis                                                                                                                       

NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme and past blog
entries to be found on Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’: @Pistis_wonders 

---

[i] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/congress-begin-electoral-vote-count-amid-protests-inside-outside-capitol-n1253013

[ii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_monarchs_by_nickname

[iii] Thank you for the confirmation VP Pence (op cit)

[iv] https://www.ft.com/content/448c69a6-18f3-4fa0-a3ad-50e8ce553e1e

Pistis reclaims the old year (weekending January 2nd 2021)

 

‽istis reclaims the old year (weekending January 2^nd 2021)

20:20, perfect vison; the wonders of hindsight[i]… and the apparent conclusion from so many commentators, editorials and ‘op-ed’ pieces? Perhaps a year like no other!

Except ‽istis wonders (the other sort of wonder) whether 2020 - in many respects - possibly, perhaps, may not prove to be a year pretty much like oh so many of those that proceeded it? ‽istis pauses as the pubs and community halls remain shut, as the few fireworks valiantly flare, as the streets of towns are subdued - to reflect on themes that have somewhat preoccupied the 2020 blog entries, the ponderings of recent years – perhaps nearly a lifetime of wondering:    

‽ whether perhaps the ‘excess deaths’ (a phrase that perhaps diminishes and distracts from the utterly unique lives and loves, families and friends, the left and bereft, the miraculous taken-for-granted ordinariness or the achievements on stages domestic or public) also at least remind us that every year for every single one of us it is always ‘when’ and ‘how’, sooner or later; never, ever ‘if’?  

‽ whether possibly the seemingly broken promises (based possibly on expressions of unfounded optimism; even bubbling somewhat inevitably up from hubris, exceptionalism and a sense of entitlement; even based for some on a public parade of confidence over competence), the best guesses, the change of tack, the ‘U-turns’, the reappraisals in the face of rapidly developing circumstances and fresh evidence – serve to remind us that jazz extemporising, making it up, muddling through, not quite knowing what one is doing - is more the norm in every year?

‽  whether maybe in every year, those who generally ‘have’ will more than likely generally thrive; that attribution theory will probably continue to justify ‘me’ and judge ‘you’; that friends will likely benefit; that power mixed with prejudice will generally, systemically and individually turn in to discrimination, oppression, denial, exclusion?

‽ whether perhaps in every year, the essential workers are always essential; just more or less recognised?

‽ whether possibly in every year, none of us are really safe unless everyone is safe; that our fates are connected, if not quite collective; that we are probably in the same storm but maybe in different boats; that the way ‘you’ (singular and often plurally for groups of people geographically or in communities of interest) die may be linked directly or indirectly to the way ‘I’ or ‘we’ (perhaps in communities of often-disinterest) live?

‽ whether maybe in every year it is the personal connections, the opportunities to meet with others; to be entertained, to entertain, to suspend disbelief; to gather, to commune, to laugh and cry, to hug and hold and touch - that keep us going?

 ‽ …and you might add your own variations on this theme of similarity within difference and difference within similarity[ii]…?

And so ‽istis wonders whether

·        if we thought of this past year as perhaps, possibly, maybe not so different to previous years (save for any revelations about the similarities not the differences, about long-term trends and narratives and meta-narratives, about age-old questions of how to ‘be’ and how to value and how to live, together)

·        if we challenged a little more the resigned ‘it is what it is-ness’

…might we just imagine a little more how different the world could be?

© Pistis                                                                                                                       

NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme and past blog
entries to be found on Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’: @Pistis_wonders 

---

[i] …and wonders why hindsight seems so often to be wonderous/wonderful…

[ii] A critical focus of ponderance for a researcher…? Discuss