Two Nouns #18 -- Indian Summer
A warm day in the months after the fall equinox is a delight, and I enjoyed them greatly -- though on airplanes too often.
The phrase that describes such days – Indian Summer – triggered a debate among my British and American friends as to its origins. Did the British invent the term in reference to the temperatures of their ex-colony in Asia, or did the Yanks coin it, referring somehow to the endemic population of the Americas? Each nationality laid out our best remembered case for ownership. It was a moment of cringed whispers and forgotten history – a reminder that white-man-big-stick sagas lurk near the surface on both sides of the Atlantic. (Answer below...* )
Right now the joke is that the two countries share a leader. The pear shaped, blonde tipped symmetries of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are too good to ignore. Both are made for TV caricatures, come to power on the back of their exhibitionist tendencies. Wielding claims to everyman status despite decades within gilded cocoons. Self interested and thin skinned. Gaffe machines, sexually immature, astride a supposed tide of populism and nationalism in societies that have force fed the world liberal democracy for a combined century.
Shameless is a fair adjective for both, but even so, it's different. Trump's id is ignorant of norms and law, a bloodhound for constitutional violations. Johnson knows better -- he's stress tested the fundamentals of British governance politely, in service of the rudderless entitlement native to the English ruling class.
Both are now in the throes of potential comeuppances. Trump is going to be impeached, and most of the evidence suggests rightly so. I am not so cynical I think a conviction is without meaning. Johnson, having lost his first six House of Commons votes and having flown past the Brexit deadline he swore he’d rather face ditch death than miss, will be graded on his performance on 12th December. He is not well liked -- and yet his comically unpopular rival, Jeremy Corbyn, is afflicted with the same reckless will to power that may hand Johnson a win.
Which means it’s game on for polling and prognostication, a largely indoor sport. I concede that electability chess presents a seductive distraction from the endless wait for election days (though it’s quick as a Brazilian wax in the UK). Polling especially nourishes a belief that elections are comprehensive examinations of public will. They are obviously not – results should be weighted by turnout – but I’m interested in how each country demonstrates its commitments to this noble fiction.
UK political energy has been unusually consumed with “the will of the people” since a decade of popular referendums (a change to voting protocols, Scottish independence, Brexit) highlighted the issue. Respecting “the will of the people” has been a bedrock of pro-Brexit argumentation – and a refrain of the Remain camp, too. (Remember that ex-PM Teresa May didn't even vote for Brexit.) Even now, many current MPs hope to keep the vote frozen in 2016, like the boxed cat you don’t know is alive nor dead. Despite evidence of impending gloom (not least the newly-hiked cost of borrowing for the government), public servants are panicked any action to halt Brexit will seem illegitimate (like… the Crown?). This is awful. I'm stunned as British bureaucracy keeps calm and trudges on, claiming, with middling proof, that “people just want to get on with it.”
The People's Vote people definitely do not want to get on with it.
Then it also struck me that I’d rarely – maybe never – heard an American national politician make reference to “the will of the people.” These days, the "coup" conspiracy theory is a wilting argument for defending Trump – made by Republicans happy to rig the census when the time comes. And yes, every time the US popular vote diverges from the electoral college, it’s noted briefly with dismay. But to observe the day to day work of American national governance is to agree politics are not even trying to be representative.
Kamala Harris tied her campaign to the prosecutor's oath to stand "for the people."
Kafkaesque barriers to voting and the overwhelming influence of money are particularly American nonsense. The opinions of people with landlines and a few demographically untrustworthy states are given godlike powers. Majorities of Americans support gun control, reproductive choice, and lower priced prescription drugs, and yet. If the Senate isn't enough proof, the eras of three-fifths-ism and delayed suffrage and billionaire tears make it super clear: the United States is a republic by design, intended to be run by a "natural aristocracy", however big that “We” looks on the Constitution.
The British multiparty system doesn't deserve too much credit -- I mean, most MPs aren't from and don't live in their constituencies. And in this election, it looks likely that a majority will choose parties opposing Brexit, but basic tribalism will lead to the less popular outcome. But at least there's now a robust pretense of caring what ordinary people think. So in a few weeks, I will cast my third UK electoral vote in three years, hoping the will of the people isn't dead yet.
Something to watch:
If you're already done with The Crown, and at the risk of extending my UK/US standup routine (“British people be like…” ) I recommend a rewatch of Four Weddings and A Funeral, which hit its 25th anniversary and saw a Hulu remake recently. I had remembered the film for the unbroken barrage of “fuck”s that pepper its first scene. I appreciate it now for the tragic fashion, and the seamlessly modern queer romance and disability subplots. We should celebrate the moment in which Andie McDowell recites her roster of hookups as vigorously as the Katz’s Deli scene from When Harry Met Sally. The racial inclusion score is (*inhales sharply*) but perhaps you will enjoy the first recorded sighting of the bumbling white Englishman – a character we would have needed to invent had Hugh Grant not done so for us.
Something to consider:
I did a major closet purge this fall and spent Black Friday recirculating my possessions to good causes (in the UK the majority of thrift stores directly benefit local charities). But if you are going to buy things this season, be inspired by the brilliant Ann Friedman's generous list of mindful-consumerist holiday shopping ideas -- you may even feel good about the season of spend.
This clever "Art Oracles" tarot/deck provides wisdom and whimsy year round.
*On Indian Summer: The phrase became popular in the 1850s, born in reference to American indigenous communities. Happy Thanksgiving!
Dayo