Wider Perspectives Are Needed Now

Not even going to mention that reflecting pool

Hi hi hi, hello hello, welcome everyone and anyone to this week’s episode of Crone Life, my colorful chronicle of getting older and sometimes, wiser. Happy Solstice!¹

Hommage a David Hockney. I bought this poster on Ebay for $19.99. It probably costs more now.

This has been a feel-good week in more than one way. Everyone in New York City is still so happy that the Knicks won! The city is on its best behavior, being all cute and funny. In my experience, having lived there for 35 years, NYC is much cuter and funnier than anyone who doesn’t live there ever realizes. The 21st century has been hard on the city, especially 9/11, the Great Recession, and the Pandemic, but now there’s a Democratic Socialist as Mayor and the Knicks won their first title in 53 years. There are tons of people out in the streets and they are not desperately fleeing from a disaster downtown, they’re practically skipping with glee, smiling at everyone and hugging one another. Now that’s the kind of city I want to live in.

The World Cup is buoying every American’s mood with its display of nations coming together to enjoy soccer, a sport which is not the most popular in this country. Americans prefer homegrown games, like football, basketball, baseball. We guard our sports culture closely. Soccer is for foreigners. But these foreigners are being cute and funny, what with putting traffic cones on the heads of civic statues and drinking up all the beer in Boston, as the Scottish fans are purported to have done.² The small city of Lawrence, Kansas, has welcomed the Algerian national team with open arms. The enlarged group stage is making things a bit soggy, though. I’m not seeing much quality in the box. I turned off the Spain-Saudi Arabia game right before the first hydration break because the score was already 3-nil. The game ended 4-0, after a Saudi own goal. Spain looked good though! Eighteen-year-old Lamine Yamal is the cutest. Let’s hope he stays healthy.

Are the Americans going to win the World Cup this time? No, of course not. But they might make it past the round of 32 or even the round of 16. There’s an extra round in there for the first time ever, so who knows how it will turn out. Sorry if this sounds too inside soccer, but the group stage of the World Cup is usually all fun and games as fans are force-fed the best teams in the world, many of them not yet in top form. The group stage is always like this and now it’s even overwhelmingly so because of the expanded roster. How much fun is it to watch the better teams play badly and run right over little teams that probably shouldn’t even be there? I started out wanting to watch everything I could in case there was an upset, but knowing that 32 of 48 teams are going to make it through to the first knockout round siphons off a lot of the tension. My husband, a massive soccer fan, has only watched England v. Croatia and USA v. Australia. I think he’s waiting for the next round before he pays real attention.

It feels like we’re all waiting for something. This month is like a hydration break. World Cup play seems like it’s occurring in a parallel dimension, with the Iranian team playing Belgium in LA.³ The nation is reluctantly poised to see what dumb thing Donald Trump does next, so pundits can pontificate on how it will affect the midterms. I’m waiting for June to end so I can start my long vacation. Five weeks is already seeming like not enough time for all the naps I want to take.

Moving from the global to the personal, on Thursday I used the last of my 2025-26 fiscal year time off to accompany my mother (and sister) to a memorial service for one of her friends, a teacher and church member and pillar of the community, who held me as a baby and whom I have known for my entire life. My mother has had a close group of friends since the 1960s, all college-educated married ladies who raised their daughters to be the same. They lived in the same town, went to the same church and sang in the same choirs. They’ve been dying off slowly. Now only a few remain. I spent the low-key memorial service, which her son and daughter opened by saying “after our dad’s service, our mom told us not to have one for her,” thinking “it’s probably going to be us next.” I wonder if anyone will still be around to attend.

News from Veronica

She’s just waiting for me to go away

She continues to spend most of her time outdoors, pouncing on invisible prey or napping in a bower of ferns. I stood on the deck and watched her pull some leaf detritus out of a dip in the ground, using her forepaw. Nothing interesting came of that. Then she bounded forward to crouch, tail twitching, keenly focused on something in the grass. She does seem to be having fun.

1. Also Happy Father’s Day to all who celebrate!

2. I do worry about the Scots and their drinking.

3. They flew in for the game, then out again, without even pausing for post-game ice baths.