There are times when nature gives us all a big surprise! These occasions can make one feel like that the terrain is no longer familiar. Recently, the Algerian town of Ain Sefra recorded the first snow fall they have received in thirty-seven years. Photographer Karim Bouchetata stated:
“Everyone was stunned to see snow falling in the desert, it is such a rare occurrence. It looked amazing as the snow settled on the sand.”
Bouchetata added that the snow lingered a day before melting. Ain Sefra, founded in 1881, has a population of about 35,000. It’s in western Algeria about 28 miles east of the border with Morocco. While it has a blistering hot summer climate, with average highs around 100, it’s somewhat chilly during winter. Perched at an elevation of more than 3,500 feet (1,078 meters), its average December high temperature is only around 50, with average lows in the upper 30s. ‘Everyone was stunned’: Snow falls in Sahara desert town for first time .
Well, its Winter and for some of us its snowy and chilly, for others it is perhaps more temperate. But the atmosphere, particularly this post-election atmosphere, is a bit like snow falling on the Sahara.
“Everyone was stunned to see it.”
Stunned is a good word. I’m wondering whatever happened to truth based upon facts. I’m wondering why there is so much doublespeak and gaslighting going on with the people who now will assume control of the government. Shahida Arabi has written:
Gaslighting is a manipulative tactic that can be described in different variations of three words: “That didn’t happen,” “You imagined it,” and “Are you crazy?” Gaslighting is perhaps one of the most insidious manipulative tactics out there because it works to distort and erode your sense of reality; it eats away at your ability to trust yourself and inevitably disables you from feeling justified in calling out abuse and mistreatment.
George Orwell, I’m sure, is rolling in his grave.
How did we get so desperate that we would tolerate a situation like we are currently experiencing? A friend of mine has recently observed “Where is the outrage? “ When various groups can be attacked by political leaders, including a President-Elect and there are no consequences for them that they get away with their falsehoods and character assassinations without impunity, you really begin to wonder, in the words of the film director Phillipe De Broca of “King Of Hearts” (1966)“In times of war, who are the enemy, the lunatics inside the asylum or the lunatics outside the asylum?”
The scene of snow falling, even momentarily, on an Algerian desert landscape was a mystical, even miraculous event. Right now, our world needs all the mystical, miraculous events that we can find.
Perhaps the snow falling on the Sahara can melt away the heat, the anger and the enmity that is so visceral right now in our world.
Can we experience again the peace promised in this Holy Season, this time of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa , etc. ?
Can we resolve to mobilize and live out this peace, in a real meaning way, in our daily lives now and in the future ?
May it be so.
Originally published at medium.com