Rock Bottom

ROCK BOTTOM

 

Nadir:  The lowest point.  Every now and then one hears a word used and thinks, “That’s perfectly what that word means.” Or one experiences something and thinks, “This is such and such word personified.”  Well, I recently experienced the nadir of being surveyed over the phone.  One cannot get lower than being hung up on by the pollster. 

   Here’s what happened.  Phone rings.  I answer it.  Typical intro from pollster.  Survey begins.  My responses: Yes, I’m a registered voter.  Republican.  Highly likely to vote. 

   That’s as far as I got.  Then the man on the other end of the line said, “I am sorry.  My machine is showing that it has reached its quota of data and any more will overload it.  We must end this survey.   Goodbye.” 

   One can be overloaded with info, but I think I might be underloaded. 

    Take the Tea Party movement, for example.  “You name it, they will protest it.”  That was what I first heard about the Tea Party.  Being a product of the ‘60’s, I therefore had images of young radicals ready to start a riot at a moment’s notice who had joined forces to create a 3^rd Party rival to the establishment’s two parties.  

   Not always making connections, several weeks later I was told that a Seton family hosted a Tea Party that was really well attended with great speakers.  (In my mind I was not capitalizing “Tea Party”.)   I thought it was a little strange, but it sounded like a pretty good social, though it also sounded as if the house would have been overcrowded, assuming that the tea party would of course be in someone’s home. 

   It reminds me of the time I got a letter well into the year 2000 from cloistered Poor Clare Sister Rose Marie.  She said something like, “I now know what Y2K stands for, but I still don’t know why anyone would be worried about it.” 

   While much of the rest of the world was hoarding bottled water and trail mix, or having underground gas tanks put into their backyards, or taking all of their savings out of the bank for safe keeping under their mattresses, the Poor Clares had no idea there was anything to worry about.

   My brother John also had no worries about Y2K.  While I was home during the summer of ’99 with John and Mom there were advertisements on  TV that would show a family getting ready in various ways for Y2K – as a model for what we all should be doing.  The family had a meeting and decided to have a store of water, flashlights and batteries – I can’t remember what else.

   I asked after one of these, “So what are we doing to prepare for Y2K?” 

   John often had strong opinions clearly stated.  He responded, “If that family can survive Y2K, we are not going to have any problems.”  End of preparations.

   I do now listen to Farm Radio 1010 KSIR sometimes.  Here’s an argument that was advanced yesterday.  Caged chickens and feedlot cattle produce better than their free range and pastured counterparts because they have all the stress of life taken away:  they don’t have to worry about predators, where their next meal is coming from or finding a mate.  They produce better, are healthier and happier.

   And they never worry about Y2K or politics and never get hung up on by pollsters.

 

Jezu, ufam Tobie