Syllabus #71

The blows just keep coming.  Ruth Bader Ginsburg.  Notorious RBG.  Trailblazer, hero, scion of decency.  Her dying words were, "My fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed."  After a lifetime of service and fighting for justice, can you imagine carrying that burden as you go about the business of dying?  If anyone is deserving of peace and rest, it's someone like RBG.  Let's do everything we can to uphold her legacy.  Make donations, call your senators.  Put your head between your knees and wail, then wipe your nose and get back to it.

RBG exhibit at the National Museum American Jewish History, Philadelphia 

I was lucky enough to see the RBG exhibit at the National Museum of American Jewish History last December with my mom and Chuck.  She was born the same year as my grandmother, 1933, and it was fascinating to see the time and circumstances in which she grew up.  How many obstacles did she have to overcome by sheer force of will to become the person we know her to be today?  I tried to imagine my grandmother following a similar path.  I've long held that she would have made a good lawyer - she's always questioning, always arguing, sometimes, it would seem, for the sheer fun of it.  Ruth proved to all the generations of women that followed that they, too, could achieve anything.  She proved it by her example, and she ensured it by fighting for equal legal protection for all.  

---

If you, like me, are terrified about what a conservative Supreme Court appointee might do to eviscerate women's rights, civil rights, LGBTQ rights, immigrants' rights, and so on, I wrote us a little ditty, to the tune of DJ Kool's Let Me Clear My Throat:

Now all you ladies in the place
If you got real anxiety, real fear
If you got a birth control prescription, or you're going to Planned Parenthood
And y'all need Roe v. Wade to not be overturned so you can handle your business
Make some nooooooiiiise

---

So it's been a week.

This final comment from retired Justice Kennedy:  "By her learning she taught devotion to the law. By her dignity she taught respect for others and her love for America. By her reverence for the Constitution, she taught us to preserve it to secure our freedom."

Well, shit.  It's gonna be the winter of our discontent and there's not a lot we can do about it.  Except, you know, vote (for Biden, obviously) so that we can get ourselves on the right track, finally.  And wear your damn mask.

Yes, is this a medical procedure?  Is there a co-pay?  Do I need an appointment?  Sign me up.

Analog Reading:

Elena Ferrante's The Lost Daughter.  Short and sweet.  This is one of her earlier novels, or perhaps it's slim enough to be considered a novella.  It was interesting to see how she later repurposed or reimagined certain characters for her Brilliant Friend tetralogy.  

Michael Arceneaux's I Can't Date Jesus:  Love, Sex, Family, Race, and Other Reasons I've Put My Faith in Beyoncé.  This book is a delight.  It is insight into a lived experience so totally different from my own, but it is also relatable and often hilarious.