Sunday Morning Update: 12/29/24
I went to bed at 8:15, barely able to keep my eyes open, and slept for a solid eleven hours, to the point that the cats were coming into the Recovery Room to question why they hadn’t yet been fed. When I finally got around to checking my phone, which had been knocked onto the floor, the AP alerts told an interesting story. 8:33 – 17 dead in South Korea airliner crash. 9:46 – 29 dead …. 11:23 – 74 dead …. 12:29 – 179 dead …. In the end, AP reports A total of 179 people — 85 women, 84 men, and 10 others whose genders weren’t immediately identifiable — died in the fire.
Exactly what happened is still unclear. The Muan tower issued a bird strike warning and gave permission to the Jeju Air flight to land on a different runway. The landing gear was never deployed. The plane skidded along the runway on its belly before crashing into a concrete barrier and exploded into flames. Aviation experts who talked to Reuters expressed doubts about a bird strike affecting the landing gear, though, and raised additional questions. “Why didn’t fire tenders lay foam on the runway? Why weren’t they in attendance when the plane touched down? And why did the aircraft touch down so far down the runway? And why was there a brick wall at the end of the runway?” said Airline News editor Geoffrey Thomas.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the border, North Korea’s roly-poly dictator with a bad haircut announced his toughest anti-US policy yet. Never mind that North Korean troops fighting in Ukraine on behalf of Russia are dying almost as fast as they’re deployed. This overgrown toddler with a bad temper has absolutely no regard for the people he governs. He wants to be the biggest bully on the block, but all he’ll ever be is an afterthought.
At this point, I’m not sure that there is anything that can salvage this dumpster fire of a year. Among all the year-in-review articles floating on every news page, I was most interested by a statement from Taryn Simon in her piece for the New York Times. “You can’t see anything reflected in boiling water. But when it’s still, water is a mirror,” she said. “It’s still in the anticipation, and it’s still in the aftermath. But we’re told to watch when it’s boiling.” There has been a lot of boiling in 2024 and there are already plenty of people turning up the fire for 2025. We have to look carefully at all that’s going on, watch the water after it has settled, before seeing the reality of what’s happening.
I’m afraid I’m going to need a new coffee machine (yes, there’s a metaphor coming). The machine that I bought in 2015 has reached a point where I have to wait two to three hours for half a pot of coffee. Never mind that I put in enough water for a full pot. Half the water is evaporating before it hits the ground beans. The problem is blockage. We have hard water and over almost ten years of use, the narrow lines have limited the speed at which water is moved from the heating tank to the basket containing the coffee. Sure, we’ve tried various solutions over the years, but ultimately the corrosion wins. I’ve had to drink my morning coffee a half cup at a time.
Countries are the same way. Boiling water is useful, removing impurities and such, but when water is left boiling too long, it begins to evaporate. If the heat isn’t removed, the whole thing becomes useless. Corrosion, corruption, lies, deceit, and fear-mongering destroy what should be useful conversations. Exclamations that amount to “this is my country, not yours,” keep tempers hot. We stop talking and start yelling. We stop listening. As a country, we’ve been boiling for so long that we’ve forgotten what turned on the heat in the first place. Our lines of communication are so corroded with opinions and lies that the truth has trouble getting through.
The price of coffee keeps increasing, as well, but that’s another conversation for another time.
Make no mistake, life in the US has been worse. Drop back to the 1930s, less than 100 years ago, when the depression was in full swing, when organized crime controlled much of the nation, when soup lines were a necessary part of survival, women’s rights were largely nonexistent, and “alternative” sexualities were unspoken. People needed to have large families because the odds of children surviving into adulthood were too slim, and the odds were just as bad for mothers surviving childbirth. Families in rural America often maintained their own cemeteries because they just kept dying.
The problem is that we don’t need to be anywhere close to challenging century-old statistics. The economy is, supposedly, booming. Medical science allows us to live over 100 years. We throw out more food than we can consume. So, why aren’t our lives better?
Consider the possibility that we have so much of everything, that we’ve lost our damn minds and don’t know what to do with it all. Prime example: the disaster that is method dressing. Sorry, this world doesn’t need more impractical red-carpet looks, especially when there’s no fucking red carpet. Neither do we need to see anyone’s butt crack. Whale tails and jelly everything weren’t good ideas the first time around. WTF is “pre-shower” makeup? What’s the difference between a “mushroom bob,” “micro-bob,” and “boy bob”? I’d ask Kat but I’m afraid she might throw something at me. We have made 2024 just as much of a cultural nightmare as the political climate.
Maybe our best move at this point is to start 2025 by turning down the fucking fire and letting the water be still. Pour vinegar over the corruption and see how much melts away. Replace what’s not working in our lives.
Clearly, our approach to 2024 was a bad one. Let’s try something different.
Monday Morning Update: 12/30/24
We are at that point where end-of-the-year deaths are kicking in. Linda Lavin, who became a familiar face on TV playing ‘Alice,’ died yesterday at age 87. Charles Shyer, ‘Father of the Bride’ and ‘Baby Boom’ filmmaker, dies at 83. The founder of Cablevision and HBO, Charles Dolan, died at 98. At least 66 people died after a truck plunged into a river in southern Ethiopia. 18 passengers were killed in 2 separate road accidents in Pakistan. Indy’s homicide rate hit 200 yesterday, but overall, the nation’s murder rate continues to decline.
What’s dominating headlines this morning, though, is the death of former President Jimmy Carter, the 100-year-old longest-living president of the US. All the tributes being raised are appropriate for no one deserves as much respect as does President Carter. You don’t have to look far to find lists of all his accomplishments and the challenges that cost him a second term. Thousands of people have stories of their encounters with the former president, most of which are overwhelmingly positive. I am fortunate enough to have two.
The first came in a reception line in 1997. I was photographing the event and it wasn’t until everyone else had filed through that I was allowed to meet the former President and First Lady. I wasn’t expecting anything more than a tired handshake and maybe a ‘nice to meet you’ or ‘thank you for coming.’ The fatigue was showing on the President’s face, the hour was late, and there was absolutely no reason for us to have a conversation. Yet, when I extended my hand, he took it firmly in both of his and held it. He smiled with that trademark smile and we talked for nearly five minutes, an eternity in presidential time. We briefly discussed photography and the event but quickly moved on to family, faith, and concerns about the future. He didn’t temper his statements to be politically correct. He was forthright and candid in his opinions. I left significantly more impressed than I could have imagined.
The second encounter was by chance in 2002. I was exploring numerous side projects at the time, one of which involved trying to get a grip on exactly what happened during the Iranian hostage crisis. At the time, there was still a lot of information that hadn’t been digitized, so my best resource was Carter’s presidential library. After pouring through pages of redacted documents, I stepped outside for a breath of fresh air. Off to the side, totally undisturbed and almost unrecognizable, was the former President kneeling down to tend to a young flowering plant. He was wearing jeans, a denim jacket, and an Atlanta Braves ball cap.
I had no intention of disturbing him; I had no right nor reason. He was busy working with the plant, as far as I could tell there wasn’t even Secret Service around (they were there, I just didn’t see them). I sat on a concrete bench and was looking through my notes when I felt a hand on my shoulder; it was the President. Smiling, he asked, “It’s Charles, isn’t it? I almost didn’t recognize you with the long hair.”
I started to stand but his hand sat me back down. “Don’t bother,” he said. “I was going to sit down anyway.” He inquired as to what I was working on and when I told him his expression and tone grew serious. He asked, “What’s your perspective?”
“It seems like it was a lose/lose situation no matter what you might have done,” I told him.
He nodded. “There’s still a lot that’s classified which prevents me from fully explaining our decision-making process at the time. Let’s just say that there are moments we can’t see clearly until we’re looking through the lens of the past. If I had known then what I know now, the situation would never have happened.”
We talked for almost thirty minutes, discussing the challenges of dealing with multiple concurrent crises, the politics of international negotiations, and trying to parent a rebellious child (Amy) while running for re-election. He talked openly about deception, political interference, and the loneliness of taking an unpopular stance (he wanted to officially recognize Palestine). He worried that 9/11 proved how vulnerable the US is and how the unpredictability of terrorism sometimes backs presidents into a corner. Winning isn’t always an option.
A phone call from his wife, Rosalyn, brought an end to our conversation. We shook hands and he went inside. I gathered my things and stopped for a chili dog on my way back to the office, pondering what had just happened. Such accessibility to any other president would be impossible. He broke the mold in ways we still can’t imagine.
There will be a lot said, a ton of analysis and re-examination, over the next week and a half. President Carter’s state funeral has been set for January 9. There will also be memorials in Atlanta and internment in Plains. People will say a lot of things, share a lot of memories, and build up a life that was unique in his public service.
I’ll sit here wishing I could have seen him again, had another conversation. I’m sure his perspective had changed even more over the years. He was an extremely intelligent and thoughtful person who never, ever stopped thinking.
His death closes one of the most chaotic years in memory. I’ll never forget the experience, the humanity, and the honesty of the gentleman from Plains. May he rest in peace.
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