Heat and Chill

Yesterday was surreal, in so many ways.  I wrote my apocalyptic blog post, but we had beautiful weather.  The day began with grumpiness, but ended in the sweetness of an evening on the deck, watching the birds, eating popcorn, and reading.  One of the advantages of turning off our social media early is that I didn't find out about the Trump indictment until this morning.  Instead, we watched some YouTube clips of Muppets singing before watching an episode of South Park, truly a surreal way to end the day.

We did hear about the death of Pat Robertson, which prompted a review of religious zealots who have impacted our timelines, so many of whom have died.  In my younger years, I avoided the outrage that so many others have felt over what these men and a few women did to the Church and larger society.  But I can't avoid the sorrow, and death does not diminish that sorrow.

Part of me is always running alternate timelines--how would society have changed if this had happened, instead of that?  I realize that life might not have been any rosier if there hadn't been conservative religious people who got a national stage and preached oppression and hate.  But it's hard not to think about all the ways life might have been better for more of us if there hadn't been the persistent chorus of those men and a few women spewing their lies and their hate.

We didn't dwell long on that.  My spouse wanted to unpack some boxes and get some of our kitchen stuff back into cabinets, so we pitched ourselves into that.  It sounds so easy, but it meant trying to find the kitchen boxes in the midst of all the other boxes, the ones that came back from seminary and the ones we didn't unpack after the move because we knew remodeling was coming.

We had earlier than expected arrivals from the kitchen remodel experts, the one who came to give us the temporary sink and the gas plumber who is instrumental in making our new gas stove functional.  The water plumber was able to fix the leak at the cold water valve in the kitchen that we hadn't been able to fix and the gas plumber made an elegant installation and had a CO2 monitor that we could buy from him and not Lowe's.  The gas stove is not functional yet; several steps need to happen, like the county inspection and the gas company making final connections, but the gas plumber will shepherd the process.

By the end of the day, I was exhausted, but going to bed at 5:30 seemed like a defeat of some sort.  So we had a light supper on the porch, and while my spouse watched the Merlin bird app identify birdsong, I read a few essays from the new volume by David Sedaris.  Part of me wanted to stay on the deck until sunset, but part of me wanted to drift off to sleep on the couch.  The episode of South Park kept me engaged, and because of our gorgeous new sliding glass doors, I was still able to watch the sun set.  I went to bed shortly after sunset.

This morning, I looked over the news and decided to skip over all the news articles and editorials about the Trump indictment.  It was one of those news moments when I thought, come back to me when there's something new to report.  At this point, everyone seems to be doing the performative drama I expect, and right now, there's nothing new to say, and we've already been contemplating the possibilities in terms of what it means for the election.  

I was sad to hear about the death of George Winston.  I understand all the reasons why people don't like his music, but it was the backdrop to college for me.  The first time I heard the Pachelbel Canon in D, it was George Winston's version, which they played at the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum before the movie played on the IMAX screen, which led me to explore the more classical approaches to that piece of music.  It gave me a way to talk about classical music with my parents, who have so much more training in that area than I do.

I got up this morning and turned on the heat, something that has NEVER happened in June, in any other place I have ever lived in the southeastern U.S.  I'm delighted to live in a place where I don't have to dread the summer weather, the way I have in other places I have lived.  I do realize winter is coming; in fact, I bought some winter gloves this week, and a hat for my spouse, while they are on sale.  I know that at some time, I might dread the winter, but we've done a lot of work to make the house more weather proof and well adapted to all sorts of weather.