Send Me More Links

 

Snapped at an old friend.  We don’t agree on this matter of Xinjiang.  My position is that whether or not we call what’s happening a “genocide” the behavior of the Chinese government is towards a part of its domestic population is abhorrent.  There are mass incarcerations, clearly.  He wants to know how I know this.  I cited a leaked dossier of materials that the New York Times had published, which presented, among other things plans for building detention centers that can hold up to twenty-thousand people at a time who’d been “infected with bad ideas.”  I wrote a long letter, moving off of wechat, of course, trying to encourage his reflection, rather than send me more links. 

That was a few weeks ago and today he sent me some links. And so, today I blew up and and referenced the earlier letter that I’d never really gotten a thoughtful response to and went on to say that I wanted no more links, but rather his measured thinking and I sent it off and went to do the dishes and assumed I would soon be getting a rapier-slice email back illustrating weaknesses in my thinking but he uncharacteristically capitulated and said “OK.”  And of course, I then felt like a blowhard. 

 

I’d bought turnips two weeks back.  They were sitting in their bag at the bottom of the produce bucket of the refrigerator.  Tonight ,I vowed to make turnip soup, though it didn’t exactly go with anything else I was planning on making.  I peeled them and boiled them and blended them with some carrots and too much parsley and poured the liquid into a pot to simmer.  I served the concoction in little parfait glasses with little spoons and a dollop of sour cream.  Nobody sampled it but me.  And even I had to admit that it tasted rather loudly of turnips.    

 

At dinner we ended up talking about my younger daughter’s favorite topic, her summer plans.  Shouldn’t she take one or two New York Times, summer camp programs?  Shouldn’t she do volunteer work?  Shouldn’t she go somewhere to practice French or Korean?  What, after all was she doing anyway, “trying to get to Level 7 in her game?”  I knew as soon as I said it that it was a mistake.  Straws and camels, she threw her napkin down and marched off asking why it was she ever shared anything with me. 

 

I cleaned up the table and poured the turnip soup into the compost. 

 

 

 

Sunday 4/25/21