I feel like I've gone deep down the rabbit hole of collapse, resurfaced for air, and then submerged again a thousand times now, and I'm still hearing about new issues, additional factors, and more nuance to the complexity and interconnectedness--all of it saying in no uncertain terms that the whole jig we call civilization is, in fact, up.
To be clear, I find no entertainment in suffering, and I wish none of it on anyone. I don't look down on people who don't see or feel exactly what I see and feel, and I empathize with those struggling with the darkness and dread and anxiety and sadness of it all.
I respect that I have relatively little skin in the game as a childless, young man living in conditions where most of it is still there and then instead of here and now, with little to no "bucket list," good (for now) health, and only some of my immediate family still alive to worry about. I look out on the world with not a small amount of sorrow--especially for young families but really for everyone and everything that is largely innocent in all this.
It's just that there's also a little part of me that sees the dealer turn another card over and can't help but let out of those sputtering, choking, snorting half-laughs when I see that it is, yet again, exactly what no one at the table, including me, wanted to see.