I want to confess that I’m struggling with telling time. I can look at a watch and see the actual hour -- (and I wear an old fashioned analog wristwatch) – but I am no longer able to tell you whether something happened two years ago or six years ago.
Having school-aged children is very helpful in counting the days because of their development and their academic calendar. “We went on our ski trip when Toby was in 4th grade” or “that was last year at Peter’s 8th grade graduation.” Also parents tend to take a lot of photographs and videos.
The only markers I have that are real to me are the birthdays of my loved ones, and March 13th, 2020, when New York’s cultural institutions were quickly shut down. We had lunch with friends on the 14th, and then I didn’t leave my apartment for one month. Life is either before covid or post covid. That could not be more clear.
Furthermore, life pre-Trump was a relatively delicious one – the “good old days,” if you will. When I went to a concert or a play or a movie, I could fully immerse myself in what I saw and experienced, and I didn’t think of art so much as therapeutic. Post-Trump there was a good chance I couldn’t even focus on what was on the stage in front of me, so pissed off was I by the latest of the administration’s daily corruptions.
We have just a few weeks to try to staunch the hemorrhaging of infections brought on by the Superspreader and his gang, and their insistence that science is irrelevant – he seems to have rendered his own doctors irrelevant. Let’s not waste time!
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Lisa Birnbach and guest, Andrew Weissmann
I’m super excited that Andrew Weissmann, longtime Justice Department prosecutor and lead prosecutor for Special Counsel Robert Mueller. He’s written a new account of that experience, “WHERE LAW ENDS: Inside the Mueller Investigation,” published by Random House.
But first, the five things that made my life better this week:
1. Journalism, real journalism performed by real reporters. I’m not talking about spin, I’m talking about digging up facts and then explaining them clearly. It is not an easy job; it is not a glamorous job. It is hard work, not well-paid, and certainly dangerous. There are a lot of unheralded heroes these days, and reporters are among them. (Look at people like David Corn of Mother Jones and Kurt Eichenwald, and Michael Shear of the NY Times, and Lachlan Markay & Lachlan Cartwright of the Daily Beast, and Julia Ioffe at GQ.)
2. Artists online. When you need a break – and we all do. Some friends on Twitter spend a lot of their energy tweeting paintings and poems. Not a bad way to remember there are other things in life than politics and division.
3. Facetiming with Le Bébé. Our schedules are very complementary. In other words, he eats early and I wake up late. I’ve been facetiming him while he eats breakfast, and we have a fun 5 minutes. I turn into a ridiculous sound making machine and enjoy it thoroughly.
4. Cornmeal. I have always loved corn muffins. They are my muffin of choice. I have never baked one (note to self: hmm?) but when cake recipes call for cornmeal they feel so modern and a tiny bit crunchy. Yum.
5. Hope. I know we have felt so much despair in these dystopic months. I have had had to drag myself many weeks to find my five things that make my life better. But I still have hope – and we all must hang on to it.
Andrew Weissmann’s 5 Things:
1. The FT weekend edition
2. Carnegie Hall
3. V&A Museum
4. The Adirondacks
5. The NY Subway
Carnegie Hall
More About Andrew Weissmann
WHERE LAW ENDS: Inside the Mueller Investigation
By Andrew Weissmann
Published by Random House
Twitter: @AWWeissmann_
The 5 Things That Make Life Better podcast is recorded and produced at The Field in NYC https://thefieldtv.com
My team is Shpresa Oruci, Michael Porte, Sam Haft and Boco Haft.