Our Curse

My last few posts here at The Tempest have been on the pessimistic side, and for that I apologize. I blame most of it not on the financial markets, the state of my country or even the sorry state of the Washington Nationals. I blame it on the weather.

Here in Short Pump we have entered the steamy season. Some of you reading this live in parts of the country where what I am about to describe seldom happens. Here it happens for roughly three entire months of the year. In the past I have referred to it as “God’s curse upon the south for the sin of slavery.” I even took a picture of it once. How can you take a photograph of the weather, you ask? Simple…

This is what every window in our house looks like at 6 o’clock in the morning. Currently it is 68 degrees outside and the humidity is 97%. I know what you’re thinking…how can it possibly be 97% humidity if it’s not raining?? I can assure you it is quite possible. In fact it is as common as lying politicians. Still don’t believe me?

Yesterday morning it was actually ten degrees warmer, so this is somewhat of a reprieve. What’s really fun is when you get up super early to run in these conditions because you know its the best part of the day.

What’s it like to live this way? Imagine walking out to get the mail and by the time you get back inside the house your fingernails have started to sweat.  A five minute drive in a car which has been parked outside for an hour produces a pool of sweat inside your belly button. But as bad as it is for men, its far worse for women…

              BEFORE                           AFTER

Nevertheless, because I am a southern boy and this is my lot in life, I am headed out for a three mile morning walk…after which time the sweat that gets wrung out of my walking shorts and shirt will fill a cereal bowl.

22 days until Maine.

A Stranger in a Strange Land

I’ve been in a 5:00 am groove for a couple weeks now. My eyes pop open right at the stroke. There is always a frustrating dream left swimming in my head, the details of which seem crystal clear when my eyes first open but have vaporized into thin air by the time I walk downstairs to do my morning chores while its still dark outside.

I say a morning prayer while drinking my coffee. I thank God for the blessings of life, for another day. I don’t ask any favors. It seems selfish from someone who has already been given so much. I pray for whoever comes to mind, a friend who just said goodbye to her husband who died of cancer, another friend who recently had surgery and is having a rough time recuperating. Then I open my iPad and start reading the news from overnight.

There’s a story about a group of young men arrested at a gay pride event. The FBI had preempted their intentions to start a brawl in the streets. There was a picture of 30 mugshots of lost young men.

I read about an employee at Google who was let go for a public assertion that his company had created a sentient algorithm.

Then I read a story about the new Army where the traditional drill Sargent was being replaced by a kinder, gentler version more inclined to mentorship than yelling. It will be hard to eventually eliminate this iconic image from my mind…

I am informed about Justin Bieber’s latest health struggles, half of his face having been paralyzed. I wonder what could possible have possessed him to share this news publicly.

I see a mug shot of Nancy Pelosi’s billionaire husband after his arrest on DUI charges. He has the slightly annoyed but confident facial expression of someone secure in the knowledge that he is the billionaire husband of Nancy Pelosi.

Then I scan the financial news. There is a lot of it and it all seems bad. Inflation. Interest rate hikes. The obliterating crash of Bitcoin. Stocks officially in a bear market. Apparently, the pressure is on the Federal Reserve Chairman to either do something or do nothing.

I shut down the news site and escape to the MLB website for a break with the hopes that my heart will be comforted by the familiar and eternal rhythms of box scores. I learn that Stephen Strasberg has once again been deactivated from the Washington Nationals roster by yet another injury. He is currently in year 2 of a 7 year contract that is paying him 35 million dollars a year to pitch a baseball, something he has been physically unable to do almost since the very day he signed the papers. Fortunately for him, the contract was fully guaranteed. Unfortunately for the Washington Nationals, the contract was fully guaranteed.

It is now 6:30 and I feel like a stranger in a strange land. 

It’s time for a run.

Decline?

June 13. 5:46 AM

This morning I wake up with my usual Monday morning anxieties. After a rough week, I see that the news isn’t good for today’s opening on Wall Street. I read about a potential compromise on guns brewing in the United States Senate. I see where its supposed to be in the mid 90’s with oppressive humidity all week. I’ve got a guy coming to the house in just over an hour to trim back a few overhanging tree limbs. Meanwhile, the iPad I am typing this blog on has suddenly started behaving strangely, with an irritating gap between what I type and what appears on the screen. 

Yesterday morning I finally went to Patient First to deal with the pain in my left elbow. I’ve had it for over two months now but unlike in the past, the pain now doesn’t come and go—instead it has taken up permanent residence. The perky doctor instantly diagnosed it as lateral tendinitis and proved his diagnosis with a couple jujitsu moves using his gloved hands and my left arm which hurt like hell, but served to bolster his assertions. He slipped a brace on my elbow that instantly relieved the pain which came with certain movements, then he prescribed a gel to apply liberally, then shuffled me out the door. The good news is that nothing is torn.

Pam and I find ourselves in a show hole, reduced to watching a Danish political drama with subtitles and rapid fire dialogue which gives you a headache, and is difficult to watch while eating. Take your eyes off the screen for ten seconds to cut up your steak and you’ve missed a key plot detail. It’s called “Borgen” and if you pay close attention to those subtitles its actually pretty good. Still, we keep hoping to discover the next Foyle’s War and we keep getting disappointed when we don’t.

I suppose we could always tune in the January 6th show, but my overpowering sense of self-preservation prevents me from doing so. I catch the thumbnail summaries the morning after and watch a few of the videos and thats bad enough. I have made the executive decision not to voluntarily watch what is basically an infomercial about the official decline of a nation. I understand enough about history to know that world dominance has a shelf life. The Romans had their time, the Greeks before them. The British ruled the world for a while and the United States has stood astride the globe as a colossus for almost a hundred years now. Nothing lasts forever. Maybe our time is up, our years of power and prestige is in decline. We seem hopelessly divided, increasingly brutish and nasty to each other, and led by men and women unequal to the task. Heck, we can’t even agree on a working definition of treason anymore, let alone convict anyone of it. Although our public schools can’t dependably teach kids how to read, write, add and subtract, we are well on our way to confusing the Bejesus out of them with regards to sexuality and the proper pronouns used to describe the burgeoning number of genders available for them to choose from. Its hard not to conclude that I live in a nation in decline.

Of course…I could be wrong. Many people before me have come to similar conclusions about the fate of our Republic and wound up spectacularly wrong. History is complex, the forces that drive it are often unknowable. Just when national decline seems assured someone invents the computer and all bets are off. So, my conclusions might be equally wrong. 

I don’t know that I have ever needed Maine any more than I do this year.

Lucy at the Lake

I have mentioned often how much Lucy loves going to Maine, what a marvelous traveler she is, how much she adores the water. But its hard to explain it adequately with words. Explaining anything about the time we spend in Maine is a challenge. Although I’m pretty good with words I never feel like I’m able to convey the emotional impact the place has on all of us. When I scan through the thousands of pictures we’ve taken, the ones that come closest to capturing the feeling have one thing in common…Lucy is in them. Here are just a few:

I am the boss of the dock.

Always willing to assist Dad when he takes a nap.

And make sure he stays safe when he takes the kayak out.

I can’t let this one out of my sight.

Fetching my frisbee like its my job…because it is.

Guarding dad whenever he goes on a hike…

And, there are LOTS of hikes…

I help Dad fish.

…by inspecting each catch.

For some reason, whenever Mom and Dad leave me at the cabin alone they feel the need to spy on me…so I make sure to give them many different poses.

…then every now and then I act like there’s an intruder just to mess with them a little.

I love our house…

Sunsets are the best.

My happy place.

Beware The Thieves of Wonder

Famed New York Times outdoors columnist Nelson Bryant wrote what follows to his two daughters shortly before his death at age 96.

“The secret I would have you know……is that even though the years will steal your fresh beauty, it need only be, in truth, a minor theft. What you must guard against is that jaded state wherein there is nothing new to see or learn. Marvel at the sun, rejoice in the rhythmic wheeling of the stars and learn their names, cry aloud at the swelling beauty of an orchid in the white oak woods, or December’s first snow; slide down the wind with a hawk and cherish the smell of woodsmoke and mayflowers, or the caress of a warm wool blanket; tarry by a stream where willows bend and flee tedium’s gray embrace. Cherish laughter and whimsy, but battle unrelentingly for what you know is right and be aware that the thieves of wonder can enter any heart.”

Dodging Bullets

Nearly eight decades ago, wave after wave of American, Canadian and British teenagers were dodging bullets while storming the beaches of Normandy to begin ridding the world of the Nazi menace. Seventy eight years later, here’s what was going on in America yesterday:

For the first time in my life I spent $90 for a tank of gas.

Meanwhile, the Congress of the United States has hired a former ABC news executive to produce the upcoming Thursday night hearing on the January 6th riot, to be broadcast in prime time at 8:00 eastern time. While nothing can apparently be done about runaway inflation, this Congress may be the first to be nominated for an Emmy.

The Carolina Panthers of the National Football League have hired the first ever bald, transgendered female cheerleader. Now, if only they could find a quarterback.

I received a letter delivered by the United States Postal Service a mere 13 days after it was placed in the mail…from six miles away.

A reporter with the Washington Post was suspended from his job after it was discovered that he had “re-tweeted” a joke posted by someone else. The re-tweet set off a firestorm of protest throughout the newsroom with colleagues demanding the re-tweeting reporter be disciplined. The offending joke was:

“All woman are bi. The hard part is figuring out whether its polar or sexual.”

I shared a joke via social media which did not result in nearly as much controversy…

I think I dodged a bullet.

Dealing With Lucy’s Embarrassment

The Dunnevant Estate has a new house guest. Ever since our kids moved out, Pam and I have enjoyed opening up their end of the house to a series of temporary tenants in need of a place to live. We have hosted groups of students on choir tours. We housed several semesters of Liberty University nursing students in town for their clinical studies. Most famously, we housed our nephew’s then fiancée—Bernadette—for eight months while she was homeless and  stranded between college graduation and matrimony. Now, Bernadette has struck again, a little over a week ago asking us if we could possibly house a youth intern at Hope Church whose housing had fallen through. Since neither Pam nor I are able to refuse Bernadette anything, we have a new house guest for the next 10 weeks or so. This time, its a boy. He arrived here tall and thin, quiet and well mannered. From the looks of it, after eating Pam’s cooking this summer, he will leave here much thicker but hopefully still well mannered. Lucy seems to approve, always a good sign.

After months of longing we have finally entered the 30 day window on our annual Maine summer season. Actually, we enter it tomorrow morning, but who’s counting? We finally have commitments from the kids on their weeks of participation. We are thrilled that they will both be joining us this year but disappointed that they will be with us on different weeks. Once again Pam gets to celebrate her birthday at the lake (July 19), and this year our stay will be for six weeks, our longest sabbatical to date. Miss Lucy will be joining us and is delighted to have a place to go to hide her hideous haircut from all the other neighborhood dogs, who she claims have consistently mocked her since that horrible day at the groomers. Look at Lucy! She look like lab!! Yo, Luce..did you get cookie wid dat cut?? Hahaha. Your human must be blind as bat. He probably say ‘it grow back’…hahaha. Maybe by winter…bruhahaha!! Lucy can’t wait to see the expressions on all their faces when we back out of the driveway heading for Maine. Lucy will be like…Good luck with hot and hoomid, suckers. When I comes back, I will be gorgeous again and you will all still be ugly mutt-face!! I tell Lucy that the only reason the other dogs tease her is because they are so insanely jealous. I remind her of the many advantages that she was born with and that she mustn’t stoop to their level, that she must rise up and be the better dog, to which she sneezes and snorts her frustration…Easy for you to say, you not one with hack job cut…even squirrels laugh…squirrels!!

As you can see, Lucy has not gotten to a place of forgiveness. She has kept me at paws length ever since the Petsmart debacle. But whenever I mention the upcoming Maine trip her face brightens, her tail—or what is left of it—wags enthusiastically, and she allows me to give her head scratches. I’m thinking that by the time we return from Maine we will all have put the whole nightmare behind us.