"The internet has always been lawless, but the chaos of the Trump era has worsened online nastiness to the point where even I, a verifiably snarky internet writer..."

"... have grown sick of it all. Desperate for an antidote, I started dabbling in wholesome activities: bicycling, crossword puzzles, baking and writing in my journal. 'Oh no! You’re becoming a hippie,' my mother said after I informed her of my new hobbies. In these efforts to self-soothe, I made a life-changing discovery: Making sourdough bread is the opposite of using the internet...."

From a NYT essay by Eve Peyser, "I Wanted a Dog. I Bake Bread Instead." The headline highlights the dog/bread alternatives as opposed to the escape-from-the-internet theme. I'm guessing that's because dog gets hits... on the internet.

Anyway, I'm blogging this because of the mother's concept of "hippie" and the idea that it could include crossword puzzles. But I like the idea of the younger generation rediscovering the hippie lifestyle, especially if it's envisioned in positive ways — with "wholesome activities."

Also, this article fit with something else I was just reading, "In a divided U.S., therapists treating anxiety are hearing the same name over and over: Donald Trump/'Trump Anxiety Disorder' may not be an official diagnosis, but therapists know the symptoms" (Politico), which chimed with something I'd already blogged this morning, Trump himself using the term Trump derangement syndrome.

Isn't it interesting that therapists are seeing the reaction to Trump as a disorder?! And that Politico framed it that way.

Maybe mainstream media is noticing a lot of people who feel the way I do, that the antagonism to Trump is so over-the-top that it's weirder than Trump. We turn away... and toward the man we originally resisted because he was too weird.

I tried to find a picture of a hippie doing a crossword puzzle, but my search had the serendipitous effect of turning up this New Yorker humor piece from last February: "Former Hippies Put in Horrible Position of Rooting for F.B.I." ("'I always dreamed I’d spend my retirement surrounded by my grandchildren, telling them that the F.B.I. were fascist pigs,' Carol Foyler, a former hippie who lives in Santa Cruz, said. 'That dream has been shot to hell.'").