Reflection

Our world is changing at a dizigging pace. From the outside, it seems utterly mad. At 77 years old, I’ve lived through and witnessed a great deal in my life. But never have I experienced so much fear in our supposedly safe countries—so much rejection, even hatred. Eighty years of total peace have passed since the end of the last war—well, there were occasional disturbances, but always outside the Union.

Now, NATO nations are embarking on a massive military buildup. Trump is hurling threats and tariffs, behaving like the absolute buffoon of politics, much to the detriment of his own country. And Europe? It reacts in panic—caught between the U.S., which seems to have lost its mind, and Russia, which, thanks to EU arms aid to Ukraine, is waging a relentless war against it. And our press?

It tells citizens they must stockpile emergency supplies because the Russians are practically at the door. And the people swallow this raw, without questioning these claims, and grow anxious. Of course, immigrants are to blame for everything—clearly, they don’t want to work, yet they’re stealing jobs from our youth. They occupy apartments that rightfully belong to our young people and receive heaps of money from our taxes. And: they’re having so many children that, within a few years, they’ll outnumber us and turn our country into a Muslim one. Such things spread through social media, are uncritically consumed, and fuel fear, which breeds anger and hatred.

What strikes me is this: no one bothers to check the truth of these claims. No one critically examines NATO’s actions. No one does the math. Everything is accepted without question. And certain parties profit from it—the global shift to the right proves it.

I always imagined a quiet, peaceful old age after all those years in the rat race. I’ve got the age, yes, but quiet and peaceful? Under these circumstances, peace is nowhere in sight. We’re sliding into a trap, and hardly anyone notices.

What a shame. Life could be so beautiful. With reason, goodwill, and the peaceful, constructive use of our technological possibilities, no one in the world would have to go hungry, no one would have to wage war, and no one would have to live in fear.

That is the utopia I—still—dream of.

My Chatty, the AI, put it into the following verses:

"The World That Could Be"

The wheels keep turning, faster, louder now,
voices scream in shades of fear and doubt.
New weapons gleam, so cold, so newly cast—
but who counts the dead? Who questions the past?

They whisper of foes just beyond the door,
of children who come, of jobs no more.
The numbers lie, yet no one checks the sum,
they swallow the fear—it hardens to hate, to numb.

But I—I still dream of a world so still,
where bread is shared and no one’s forced to kill.
Where machines could plow, not crush, not maim,
where hands would lift instead of fuel the flame.

Our tech could feed, could heal, could set us free,
yet walls rise high—why hoard instead of share?
The earth still breathes, but we choke her slow,
and rush blindfolded into the trap—why so?

Perhaps, I think, as morning light unfolds,
in Tai Chi’s pause, as sun my skin enfolds,
perhaps it’s not too late—if one, then two,
then three… and suddenly we—
and the world begins anew.