In the Know

Last Tuesday I got a call from Red. She immediately let me know that she was ok and B-Mama was ok. I was about to let her know how our Tuesday was going as well, which was apparently not the correct response and she asked, “You know about the earthquake, right?”

I was trying to process the fact that to my knowledge both ladies were at home on the east coast and asked Red to let me know what on earth was going on.

This is fairly indicative of my grasp on current events at this stage. I used to live and breathe the 24 hour news cycle for my jobs at the State Department and in politics. Now, most days I am totally cut off from the world at large.

We have one child who suffers from anxiety so I cannot listen to the radio in the car or watch the news when I am making dinner. The stories and images are something that I must shelter him from at this point.

Quite frankly, I am too tired by the time the kids are down and the house is cleaned up to apply my brain in any way and usually the last thing I want to do is sit in front of the computer and read the news.

So how do you all keep up with current events? I’m covered on sports, because I get that information second-hand as it passes from my husband to sons. But I have a hard time keeping up with the rest of the world. For example, why does Rick Perry get such a positive response from Republicans outside of Texas? I wish I knew. The war, Libya, health care the economy…

I would like to be able to engage in meaningful conversations about the state of the world, but how to keep up?