I don’t feel that great today

I have never felt that great

Don’t tell me to exercise

Don’t tell me it’s what I ate

There’s got to be another world, oh yah…

—The Roches, “Another World,” (1985)

I managed to avoid feeling grumpy on inauguration day by staying self-absorbed. Lame, I know. But it worked. Until I checked into social media, where I discovered everyone doing what they’ve been doing for months: pulling each other’s hair, verbally tasering one another, eggs and pies flying through cyberspace, and, occasionally, some rocks. We’re really quite predictable, you know. 

On Saturday morning, amid the in-fighting and flung food, I discovered Maggie Roche had passed away after a bout with cancer. As the eldest in the Roches singing trio of sisters, she’d had a hand in penning lyrics and melodies that have soundtracked my life since the age of 11, when a woman that worked in a Nantucket music shop suggested I give the gals from “deepest New Jersey” a try. Fast-forward 35 years, and a poster of their first album cover is on the wall across the room from my bed. Arms folded and grinning, Maggie Roche’s face is one of the first things I see each day. 

Illness aside, it crossed my mind that maybe this world we’re in has become too harsh for the more sensitive souls. Life was draining enough before the political climate shifted in this country. I understand that people get older and get ill, but on a symbolic level it seems like some of our beloved creatives are checking out because their ability to tolerate the nonsense has passed. They’re not up to the big challenge facing us all. I don’t blame them. I’m not sure any of us are up to it.

The Roches were never activists, per se, but as women with quirky viewpoints and an idiosyncratic musical sound, they braved the ugliness of a male dominated industry and made musical lemonade. It struck me as ironic that Maggie Roche should leave us on a day when women all across our nations and even in other countries were taking to the streets to let their displeasure with Donald Trump be known. Despite her shyness, I bet she would’ve wanted to be there. 

Because when it really mattered, Maggie Roche could transcend her introverted ways. She waited in the lobby of a building at NYU to pounce on Paul Simon. It was the very beginning of his solo career, and he was teaching a class there. Her determination to get her songs heard speaks to an inner drive, which Simon, who invited her and sister Terre back to play for him the following week, could see and feel emanating from her. Either that, or perhaps he just wanted this seemingly loony young lady to leave him be, but it was a different time; maybe she didn’t seem loony at all. Either way, it worked. Nowadays, somebody in her shoes would probably try and reach him through a web of email addresses, eventually landing with management or an assistant if they were lucky. 

My point is that we’re used to achieving results from behind our screens. We can hide behind them, say things to each other we wouldn’t have the conviction to say to each other’s faces. We pull hair, taser, and throw food. We come on to one another, share pictures, talk dirty. But the follow-through is often lousy, even with the most base, desire-driven pursuits. How can we be expected to pull it together and lobby? 

Media comparisons of our socio-political unrest and how it might mirror the tumult of 1960s counterculture aren’t entirely off base. The “something’s happening here” sensation is real, but I fear we lack the gumption that fueled activism back then. We’re desensitized, and we’re definitely not accustomed to having to get off our asses and fight. We can’t take down the establishment from a web portal, not in any real way. And while the marches throughout the USA over the weekend were an encouraging show of solidarity, I fear the bulk of our young people are pooped out before they even get started. Remember that it was young people that kept a fire lit under our government in the mid-late 1960s, and much of it had to do with protesting war. What’s more, it was a worldwide shift; people all over the globe we’re tuning in, turning on, and dropping out. What we’re looking at now is a different animal altogether. 

I had a medical checkup the other day. I have the utmost respect for the nurse practitioner I see. She’s genuinely invested in what she does. There’s no mistaking her dedication—the passion is there. At no point during a discussion with her have I ever felt she’s phoning anything in or only half-listening to me which, sadly—perhaps horrifyingly — has been the case in other scenarios with so-called medical professionals over the years. I get the impression she enjoys it when I come in and we always steal a few minutes chatting beyond the scope (and allotted time slot) of my appointment. 

We’re only a few years apart, and she was expressing dismay about a all-encompassing malaise on the part of her teen children. “They don’t seem to want to do much of anything,” she confessed. “I mean—they don’t want to leave the house. It feels impossible to get them motivated.” 

“I find it hard to believe that someone like you could raise kids that have no natural curiosity,” I replied. The conversation then steered toward differences in values, generation gaps…I pointed out that natural curiosity is satisfied much more easily than it used to be, via the internet. 

But since the effort put forth is so little, compared to twenty years ago, there’s also a lack of investment. Your kid wants to be a veterinarian because they feel an affinity towards animals, so they go online and discover the amount of schooling involved, the long hard road before they’re involved in a practice that might sustain them a living, and suddenly, interest wanes. The apathy sets in before the journey is even truly begun. 

I used to hate it—still do, really—when people would remind me that apathy breeds apathy, usually presented within the context of exercise. Over the years, however, it’s revealed itself to me as the truth across the board of life. Our youth culture isn’t tireless and motivated. Rather, it smoked too much pot too early in the day, watched some porn, posted on Instagram, and now desperately craves a nap. Ugly generalizations? Perhaps, but I see it all around me. We don’t rally like we used to. And those with conviction seem to lack the tools to properly articulate and defend their ideas. We’ve got a bunch of young’uns that are hell bent on one idea or another, but many of them cannot explain why. 

How does this relate to being gay, you ask? It relates in as much as any of the issues facing us as we head into this new presidential term. Folks on social media say they won’t normalize Donald Trump, they will stay vigilant. We all react with outrage as unsettling things begin happening, but our reactions are part of a grieving process. We’re engaged in the act of normalizing as we do it. For many of us, middle-aged folks in particular, the world we’re now living in will never seem normal. But we’re unable to stop the daily flow of our demanding lives to try and deal with it. It’s overwhelming. So we freak out in a public online forum, verbally taser a few looky-loos that seem not to share our views, and move on to the next adorable animal video (which makes us wish we’d gone to veterinary school despite the long hard climb). 

I do it too. I’m not attempting to suggest I’m somehow above the mess. Maybe I’m just observing differently. I resent being made to feel like I need to somehow pull courageousness out of my ass in order to do my part. I resent my peers for expecting it of me, but more so, I resent the Americans that have put us in this position at a time when, I fear, we’re just not up to the challenge. We can’t all be like young Maggie Roche, transcending her own introverted nature to chase a dream. 

So, what do we do now? I haven’t the foggiest. The women’s marches over the weekend were glorious, and for a few hours if felt like we were on the right page. Folks brought their children—a fantastic step in the right direction. That said, it doesn’t feel like taking to the streets is going to be effective. We need our radicals to step up. Hopefully they’re not sleeping off this morning’s bong session. 

Think how good just normal feels

A Helmet on my head

Constant flow of ice cream in

I’d be as good as dead

There’s got to be another world, oh yah…