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When I talk about what’s going on in the world, my husband gets nauseated. He tells me to stop. He wants to hear music in the car, not the news. It isn’t that he doesn’t care about the wars and famines and the degradation of the natural world. He just wants some peace.
I do ask myself, what’s the use of talking about these things? Yet when I abstain from keeping myself informed, a kind of agitated guilt rises up. The streets where I live don’t have netting strewn across light poles to catch deadly drones. No bombs are falling. Does my having the luxury of safety give me the right to avert my eyes?
My father spent thirty years as a 7th- and 8th-grade social studies teacher. He believed fervently that a democracy such as ours required an informed electorate. As such, he made sure that every student who crossed his path learned to value how the three branches of our government functioned, with the checks and balances, the freedom of the press, and the independence of the courts. Even the tough kids, the defiant ones who tried to mock him, couldn’t escape him. He kept them after school until they got their answers right.
In spite of my upbringing, I feel the pull of retreating into not knowing so much, or purposely limiting my awareness. Then, a woman who sought refuge in our country years ago is abruptly taken away from her American-born children without due process. Can I grab another cup of coffee and look away? I think of all the good German citizens in the 1940’s who did so when the Gestapo came for their neighbors.
Near the end of Ingmar Bergman’s film Fanny and Alexander, the patriarch of a large extended family stands up to give a toast: “The world is a den of thieves and night is falling. Evil breaks its chains and runs through the world like a mad dog… Therefore, let us be happy while we are happy. Let us be kind, generous, affectionate, and good. It is necessary and not at all shameful to take pleasure in the little world. Good food, gentle smiles, fruit trees in bloom, waltzes.”
I saw this movie when it came out in 1982 and have never stopped thinking about this scene. It’s surely in the small world where contentment arises, however transitory, and where life is vivid. The present is what we can grasp most assuredly. This afternoon when I run errands I plan to turn off the radio and blast my favorite music all the way home.
Copyright: Wendy Lustbader, 2026
