<div style="font-size:10pt;font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;color:black;"><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:10pt;color:black;"><br><br><br>-----Original Message-----<br>From: tuchyner5@aol.com<br>To: group2?bluegrasspals.com@aol.com <group2?bluegrasspals.com@aol.com><br>Sent: Tue, Mar 9, 2021 2:50 pm<br>Subject: Leonard's belated comments on Brad's Feb piece<br><br></div><div id="yiv7471433030"><div style="font-size:10pt;font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif;color:black;"><p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">This is a thought provoking essay. </span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">The concepts are difficult to put into simple
words. </span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">I think you have done a credible job of it.<span style=""> </span></span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">In the end it is clear what you are trying to
communicate.<span style=""> </span></span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">You ask and answer a lot of questions. </span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">A lot of them are left unanswered. </span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Altogether, I think you achieved a good balance.</span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Brad<span style=""> </span>sub
for 25 21</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"><br>
The New Normal? -An Essay:</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">The above phrase is frequently seen in popular
media. But what does it</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">really mean?</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">In the final analysis,</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">What is normal or normality anyway? Some say,
normal is like beauty.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">That is: in the eye of the beholder. Bruce
Cockburn tells us that: "the</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">trouble with normal is it always gets
worse!" Also we must be careful about</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">not confusing normal with typical. Because
something is typical i.e. seen in</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">a majority of situations doesn't necessarily
make it normal.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Why is the concept of normal so difficult to pin
down. One obvious answer is</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">the wide cultural and personality differences
among individual human beings.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">So what is normal for one, isn't necessarily
normal for another.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">We must also be careful not to confuse normality
with conformity.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Until some point in the 1960s, conformity was
almost automatic in the</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">majority of citizens of the United States. In
fact, it was rarely questioned</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">as to its desirability. As long as people were
working and spending all was</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">well. From the point of view of the prime movers
of society such made it</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">easier to preserve their own places in the
matrix.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">The concept of "keeping up with the
Jones's" was thought to be healthy and</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">normal.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">But social change is ultimately inevitable.
First a few and then many began</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">to question why they should care about
"keeping up with the Jones's." Who</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">ever said that we were competing with each other
to have more and better</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">possessions? Actually </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">this wasn't generally explicitly stated </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">What does “this” mean? Does it refer to what is
normal, or to what is not normal.</span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">but rather</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">implied by advertising and television. Also
glossy magazines illustrated</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">what the fully successful person's world should
look like.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">As a person with a disability growing up in such
a social setting, normality</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">was very unclear to me. In order to get things
done, I often had to do them</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">in ways which weren't at all typical; though for
me these techniques were</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">totally normal. Consequently I have always seen
normality as being a</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">flexible concept.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">By "the new normal" I believe they
mean that masks and social distancing</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">will be with us for a long while. Additionally
one pandemic means that other</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">pandemics are now possible.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Yes, I think they certainly are possible.
Likely, in fact.</span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"><span style="text-decoration:none;"> </span></span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">As more and more people on the planet are
vaccinated against Covid 19, the</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">need for masks and social distancing will slowly
decrease. Will things ever</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">revert to our pre-Covid life style? Perhaps,
though there will be a</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">difference. That is that we ourselves have been
changed by living through</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">the pandemic experience. Many things have
occurred in concert with the</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">pandemic. Issues such as America's disunity, the
problem of systemic racism,</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">more effective and appropriate techniques of
policing, the nature of</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">political leadership and many more have also
confronted us. Certainly the</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">mental health situation in the country, and for
that matter the world has</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">not been improved by the above.</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">Perhaps, these were all there, but we didn’t
notice them. The pandemic is both a result of these things and are in concert
with them.</span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><b><u><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"><span style="text-decoration:none;"> </span></span></u></b></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">We are living in a very precarious time. The
rhetoric from everywhere needs</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">to sound a more positive tone. If we learn
nothing else from the pandemic,</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">at least it should become abundantly clear,
perhaps for the first time, that</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">people in all countries around the world are
impacted by issues on a global</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">scale. All different kinds of people must put
aside their preconceived</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">beliefs about one another and realize before it
is too late that, we are all</span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;">we have! </span></p>
<p class="yiv7471433030MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:normal;background:white;"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:sans-serif;color:black;"> </span></p><br></div></div></div>