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Eyes Open With Your Mask On
Eyes Open with your Mask On is about the isolation within a society that appears to be unraveling while its citizens remain shuttered. It is the follow up to Liberté: The Days of Rage 1990-2020. Once again it is a series of interconnected stories, prose and prose poetry, centered around a theme. It also has commentaries from past pandemics and other influencers commenting on underlying undercurrents that drive the society. Its issues are often about the dividing line between black and white. Where Liberté was a book that looks outward; Eyes open is a book looking inward and the theme is isolation surrounded by the pretext of a common purpose summed up by the spirit of: We’re all in this together; now get lost
It’s a trip through the Pandemic, commenting on how a wound looks underneath, once the pandemic lifts the societal scab. People whose communities are torn apart find they can’t count on anyone but themselves and their neighbors as politicians, who abdicate their own responsibilities, encourage them to only root for either team blue or team red. A society - in need of a collective response: it’s not me us - grows increasingly more violent as they blame one another rather than their so-called leaders.
•A couple amidst a cruise watches as the outside pandemic infringes upon their vacation through television.
•Black Lives Matter and police officers, whose rogue officers are often not held accountable by the system’s officials, are pitted both against each other and lied to try to further divide an already divided country.
•A cynical look at how doctors and sports operate in a time of the pandemic.
•Politicians, going on vacation and having food delivery, as their inaction affects citizens who are forced to wait in bread lines.
•A look at case studies that were leading indicators of the schisms laid bare by the pandemic.
•Essential workers who are increasingly low paid and forced to risk their lives to take care of higher-paid workers.
All and all, Eyes Open with your Mask On is about the great unraveling of a society that looks more stable on the outside than it is beneath the surface.
It’s a trip through the Pandemic, commenting on how a wound looks underneath, once the pandemic lifts the societal scab. People whose communities are torn apart find they can’t count on anyone but themselves and their neighbors as politicians, who abdicate their own responsibilities, encourage them to only root for either team blue or team red. A society - in need of a collective response: it’s not me us - grows increasingly more violent as they blame one another rather than their so-called leaders.
•A couple amidst a cruise watches as the outside pandemic infringes upon their vacation through television.
•Black Lives Matter and police officers, whose rogue officers are often not held accountable by the system’s officials, are pitted both against each other and lied to try to further divide an already divided country.
•A cynical look at how doctors and sports operate in a time of the pandemic.
•Politicians, going on vacation and having food delivery, as their inaction affects citizens who are forced to wait in bread lines.
•A look at case studies that were leading indicators of the schisms laid bare by the pandemic.
•Essential workers who are increasingly low paid and forced to risk their lives to take care of higher-paid workers.
All and all, Eyes Open with your Mask On is about the great unraveling of a society that looks more stable on the outside than it is beneath the surface.
127 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 15, 2020
2 people are currently reading
7 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
November 24, 2020
Gary Floyd has long predicted an existential crisis for the United States, and now it is here. In his previous works, most notably in the masterful "Liberte, Days of Rage," Floyd has explored and illuminated the fraught relationship between a globalized, rapacious capitalism and the individuals and societies controlled by it. After reading his essay on globalization in "Liberte" focused on the Greek island of Paros, an astute reader may have been able to see that Floyd was sounding an alarm for a fire which was yet to have been lit.
I have long thought of Floyd as a modern day Cassandra, who can see all too well what the fruits of unbridled capitalism and globalization will bring, but whose warnings go unheeded as society rushes to grow and expand the economy at all costs. Much like Cassandra, Floyd has the gift of prophecy, but is cursed in that the average person is often too enthralled by the shiny objects of materialism to take his warnings to heart. One might say that Floyd has seen the world's most predictable and slow moving train wreck years before any other non medical essayist, yet his tragedy is that very few listened to him until it was too late.
As I have mentioned in a previous review, Floyd hesitates to do the thinking for his readers, and to directly feed them answers. Rather, he provides a lens through which those who wish to see the downside of globalization and capitalism are afforded the means to do so. "The entire world washes up on Paros." Exactly. This is a positive occurrence from a cultural perspective, and Floyd is nothing if not an internationalist who appreciates the unpredictable frisson which comes from the intermingling of cultures, particularly in the romantic sphere. He is notable among contemporary writers in that much of his oeuvre includes strong and complex female characters from a wide range of different cultures and socioeconomic strata. So, while Floyd clearly reflects the advantages of globalization in his works, there is also a more subtle shadow of the negative externalities which march hand in hand with globalization which permeate his superb vignettes. One must often look below the surface of his writings to see it, however.
As many epidemiologists have pointed out, the increased travel and encroachment upon previously unsettled territories that comes with globalization almost invariably leads to the introduction of novel viruses to immunologically naïve populations. However, while these public health experts lay this out in sometimes painfully precise detail, Floyd merely alludes to it, which is arguably far more powerful and convincing. With examples as far flung as the banishment of indigenous peoples from the island of Diego Garcia to the plight of tourists on a cruise ship during COVID, Floyd challenges the conventional wisdom that a bright wonderland of infinite consumption and satisfaction of desires await all who will jump on the bandwagon of globalization and unbridled capitalism.
In sum, Gary Floyd is a writer whose time has come. As one of the historical civil rights pioneers he features in one of his more disquieting essays would have put it, "the chickens have come home to roost." The pandemic is here, and it isn't going away. I wish I could claim that I hadn't been told, or that we as a society couldn't have seen it coming. However, like everyone else who has delved into the works of this singularly gifted modern day soothsayer, I sadly cannot claim this excuse.
I have long thought of Floyd as a modern day Cassandra, who can see all too well what the fruits of unbridled capitalism and globalization will bring, but whose warnings go unheeded as society rushes to grow and expand the economy at all costs. Much like Cassandra, Floyd has the gift of prophecy, but is cursed in that the average person is often too enthralled by the shiny objects of materialism to take his warnings to heart. One might say that Floyd has seen the world's most predictable and slow moving train wreck years before any other non medical essayist, yet his tragedy is that very few listened to him until it was too late.
As I have mentioned in a previous review, Floyd hesitates to do the thinking for his readers, and to directly feed them answers. Rather, he provides a lens through which those who wish to see the downside of globalization and capitalism are afforded the means to do so. "The entire world washes up on Paros." Exactly. This is a positive occurrence from a cultural perspective, and Floyd is nothing if not an internationalist who appreciates the unpredictable frisson which comes from the intermingling of cultures, particularly in the romantic sphere. He is notable among contemporary writers in that much of his oeuvre includes strong and complex female characters from a wide range of different cultures and socioeconomic strata. So, while Floyd clearly reflects the advantages of globalization in his works, there is also a more subtle shadow of the negative externalities which march hand in hand with globalization which permeate his superb vignettes. One must often look below the surface of his writings to see it, however.
As many epidemiologists have pointed out, the increased travel and encroachment upon previously unsettled territories that comes with globalization almost invariably leads to the introduction of novel viruses to immunologically naïve populations. However, while these public health experts lay this out in sometimes painfully precise detail, Floyd merely alludes to it, which is arguably far more powerful and convincing. With examples as far flung as the banishment of indigenous peoples from the island of Diego Garcia to the plight of tourists on a cruise ship during COVID, Floyd challenges the conventional wisdom that a bright wonderland of infinite consumption and satisfaction of desires await all who will jump on the bandwagon of globalization and unbridled capitalism.
In sum, Gary Floyd is a writer whose time has come. As one of the historical civil rights pioneers he features in one of his more disquieting essays would have put it, "the chickens have come home to roost." The pandemic is here, and it isn't going away. I wish I could claim that I hadn't been told, or that we as a society couldn't have seen it coming. However, like everyone else who has delved into the works of this singularly gifted modern day soothsayer, I sadly cannot claim this excuse.
February 28, 2021
Gary Floyd’s sequel is as intriguing as the first. I couldn’t stop reading until I was finished. His ability to tell the future is uncanny. I met him once in a bar in the mountains of North Carolina. He told me the Birds would win the Series again in 2055. He also ate all my Cheetos.
February 27, 2021
Another fantastic book of fast fiction from Gary Floyd. Keep 'em coming!
February 27, 2021
An interesting look at these harrowing times. This book was hard to put down.
January 24, 2021
This collection is another stellar offering from author Gary Floyd. I've come to love his short fiction for its hard look at society combined with engaging characters and plots that make these stories not just political statements, but stories of value and interest all on their own. These stories cause us to take a look at who we are and what we want, at where those things are for the best and where they cause us to be at our worst, and by reading these fictional pieces, we see the truth of our world and hopefully how we can make it better before it gets even worse.
May 29, 2021
A real page-turner, this book applies fictional as well a real life stories to the harsh times of the pandemic. I had a hard time putting it down. Gary is a master at flash fiction.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews