Bob Schwartz

Chicago reported the most January homicides since 2000. This is a symptom and not just in Chicago. A number of American cities are seeing similar increases.

This is a symptom of a socio-economic underclass with little hope of moving up on any significant scale. And now for the first time in the post-World War 2 era, we have a socio-economic middle class also seeing and believing that upward movement is beyond expectations and aspirations. This is expressed in the current level of nonpartisan political dissatisfaction.

These symptoms require hard and unsparing self-awareness as a nation. Whatever the underlying conditions are, the treatments being prescribed have not worked. It is dangerous folly to think that just because a person has been relatively healthy over a pretty long time, with the occasional ups and downs, the standard remedies are bound to work for any conditions. Not to mention that some treatments once lauded turned out to be ignorant and deadly. Consider that bloodletting—cutting blood vessels or attaching leeches to extract the disease—was once the height of medicine (and why barber poles are striped red and white).

According to some experts, there is a tiny chance we may fall back into a 2008-style recession. There is also a chance that in some cities we might see a summer of 2016 that looks a little like the hot summers of the 1960s. However small those chances are, we might not want to be waiting around to see if these and other symptoms go away on their own. Sometimes they do. And sometimes they don’t.

I don’t listen to music very first thing in the morning. There’s quiet, until I start making breakfast.

And then, in the kitchen, it’s finding the right music, le musique juste. Here is a very small sample from the list. All are very short, all without words or voices.

Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Perpetuum Mobile

This is what joy sounds like. Who doesn’t need a little unconditional unmitigated joy? Top of the list.

Bill Evans, Peace Piece

This may seem a little too laid back for trying to get energized. It is low-key and lovely, until Evans throws in some equally low-key jazz dissonance. Just enough to remind us that if we are able, the day can have plenty of the peace we want, but there’s bound to be a few strident notes—all of which can be resolved.

Aaron Copland, Fanfare for the Common Man

If you believe you are about to conquer your day, or conquer the world, this is your anthem—whether you are a common or uncommon person. You can take on anything. Caustion: Do not mix with too much espresso.

Erik Satie, Trois Gymnopedies: Gymnopedie No. 1

Erik Satie called what he wrote “furniture music,” meaning it was just there, but not at all unuseful, unstyled, unformed or uncreative. Minimalist music and ambient music are its descendants (not to be confused with elevator music, which is unuseful, unstyled, unformed and uncreative). This is about two minutes of the finest furniture you can sit on to start your day.