Keep Calm

A couple years ago (it had to be, because I remember it being one of those things I didn’t know how to pack when I left my Newton apartment), I bought a cheap wall placard with the iconic Keep Calm and Carry On logo.  I mostly bought it because it was cheap… with one of those orange clearance stickers that dwarfs any sense of frugality when I walk into Target.  But also, because I’m an Anglophile and not just a little obsessed with history… and definitely WWII English history.

As I have written before, it was something I found fascinating in the days after September 11th.  I lived in London then and it was a way of knowing that no matter how earth shattering, scary, and dark the news of that autumn seemed to be, human nature could indeed carry on.  And that silly catchphrase did seem to sum up the personalities of the people I worked with.  Sarcastic with a mean streak like no other… but at the end of the day… pretty low key, determined, and willing to just keep going.  Optimistic in spite of a cool expression.  It’s a way of facing things I try to replicate… even though I know my Leo blood does get a bit fiery… I think it’s ultimately best to keep one’s calm and stay cool.

Of course nowadays, I really can’t abide the sight of that stupid keep blah blah and carry on.  It has been so bastardized and commercialized… and manipulated into the most vapid, materialistic, narcissistic slogans.  I see any interpretation and feel my gorge rise.  Not just from fatigue or an eyeroll at the lack of originality… but because it is so far away from the origin of maintaining one’s calm during the blitz of German bombs and evacuating children across the ocean – not having enough to eat or wear – having no idea if the next New Year is even a remote possibility.  Maybe… well… maybe the original intent of the slogan was spin and marketing.  But it was a lot more… human… than the suggestion to buy shoes.

I was thinking about that London autumn again recently.  I’m sure the idea of September 2001 wasn’t far from many thoughts in the last weeks.  I was thinking how calm the following three months were for me.  Exploring my favorite city by foot every weekend.  Stumbling on old city gates, ruins of the Blitz left as shelter for a garden, cemeteries, the river… a lot of time to find my peace.  I forget what the noise was.  And… well, it was different.  Because I was an ocean away from the city where it happened.

So I don’t know if some of the immaturity and senseless anger is how it was twelve years ago.  If it is something that I should just forgive in an acceptance that some people deal with grief differently.  I see it as stupid and inhumane.  But, maybe it’s like I don’t get the whole keep calm and call Batman, go shopping, eat a banana, be a princess, etc.  

My hometown – the one I couldn’t get away from fast enough when I went to London… but the one I went to when I packed up that placard in a random box two years ago – is protesting the burial of a body.  I’m not even going to get into who that body was when it breathed and pumped blood.  It’s been cold for two weeks now.  I’m sure there are chemicals and some level of preservation… but seriously, it is maggot food now.  And I don’t even say that with a determination of disrespect.  Just the very real and enduring truth that a king may go through the guts of a beggar… because we are all just ultimately going to be dirt.

So… why aren’t we putting this body in the dirt already?  It doesn’t say anything if we give in to nature.  It says a hell of a lot more if we don’t.  If we cost a poor funeral director thousands just to protect his building and business from a bunch of batshit crazy people who have nothing better to do on a sunny May afternoon than raise a protest.

Then I go on Facebook and read or see stupid pictures of a hockey fan who misallocated his team spirit with a poor choice of imagery.  Not wise… but the reactions are even more foolish.

And I think of keep calm and carry on.   

And I wish we would.