When I was preparing for this first swim into the waters of Blaugust, I was jotting down ideas for potential fodder for blog entries. It was just a simple checklist that I’d tick off as/if I used them.
It struck me, though, that a number of them were negative in nature.
Me pointing out bad car designs.
Me singling out particularly, needlessly bad lyrics in songs from well established artists who should know better or should have people in their lives who quietly point out that kind of thing before the songs are released.
Me explaining how the Ontario Conservatives have put a spectacularly bad plan into motion to close the Ontario Science Centre and move it down to Toronto’s waterfront (way smaller and less accessible) that they’ve suppressed environmental impact reports to develop, including an enormous, privately owned spa, of all needless, elitist things.
But…
I realized that I don’t want to write those things.
Okay, maybe that last one a little bit…
Wait, no.
There’s too much negativity in the world already. There’s too much downside. Death and war and threats and existential dread. What the world doesn’t need is me being all, “… and another thing! ‘If I lay here’? Come on, Snow Patrol!”
Related: Pre-Covid, I had a part-time gig in the info centre of the CBC network headquarters for a few years. It had a small couch and TV that was set to CBC’s 24-hour news channel, which exposed me to over three hours of news a day. And I found, as months gave way to years, that Wow, three hours of news a day is way more than anyone needs to watch or should have to watch.
It became demoralizing and something of an emotional grind. I mean, let’s face it: News is 99% negative information punctuated with a bit of sports and weather and maybe a zoo animal’s birthday party.
To counteract all of that negativity, I sought out (and still listen to) more and more comedy podcasts. You know what nicely offsets requisite exposure to the bleakness of the world with updates to the latest tragedy every few minutes? People who are good at making people laugh despite all of that. On that note, kindly do leave a comment to this post with any suggestions for comedy podcasts.
So no, no negative posts from me this Blaugust, and maybe I can even manage to carry that forward (the Conservatives finally getting kicked to the curb would be a great help with that, though, because seriously…)
There’s too much downside that we get too much of too often. And yes, we need to know about that and speak truth to power and hold people responsible, and march if you want to march and protest if you want to protest and do whatever you can, legally and peacefully please, to let the bastards know that they aren’t getting away with it unnoticed and that history books won’t be kind to them.
But what needs to be focused on more, and is too often forgotten or even unknown, is that there’s also plenty — a whole world — of better, positive things to write about as well.
For our own sanity and mental health, a better balance between those things needs to be struck. And I’m happy to help in my own little way.
So. Here’s a start. It’s old but still upbeat.
May it make your day a bit better.