Tonight a friend was coming for happy hour at five. He emailed this morning to confirm, and I wrote back that I would have the gate open and a snack ready. So at quarter to, I put out smoked salmon, cream cheese, and crackers. Jordan poured me a glass of wine, and I fiddled at my computer while I waited. Five-fifteen, five-thirty—nothing. At quarter of six I decided something must have come up, he wasn’t coming, and I put the food away—just as he walked up the driveway. Then we both fell all over each other apologizing—he insists that I said six when I confirmed. I can’t imagine that because I know he gets off work at TCU at five, and it’s two minutes from here. I may have made a typo, but I can’t find the email to find out. At any rate, we had a good visit about books and TCU and restaurants.
Christian had thought to join
us, but Jacob’s car died in the high school parking lot today, so it was towed
to the house and carefully backed into the driveway, with the tow truck driver
holding the battery in place, so Christian could install a new battery. When
James left, about seven fifteen, he, Jordan, and Christian had a good driveway visit.
And I had a salmon and cream cheese sandwich for supper.
Today I finally cleared up the
last of the busy-ness details that had burdened me this week. Got my Origins
(cosmetics) account straightened out and was able to place an order. But it
took three chat sessions over three days, which I consider a chunk of my time.
Those chat options are great for me because when I get a tech in Indonesia, I
can’t understand her or him, but the chat moves slowly and does take time. And
often it’s over such silly small matters. But I feel good that by mid-week, I
have those niggling little items off my desk and calendar.
A few days ago I wrote about my
renewed conversation with the older sister of one of my best friends growing up—and
mostly with the sister’s daughter. You may remember I sent them a manuscript
titled, “I Wish I Lived at Eleanor Lee’s House.” Today, Leslie, the daughter, sent
me a PDF of faded newspaper clippings about the daycare program Elizabeth,
Eleanor Lee’s older sister, established in their back yard when she was twelve,
and Eleanor Lee and I were probably eight or nine. I remember it well—they had maybe
ten or twelve neighborhood kids, fed them snacks (probably Kool-Aid, yuck!),
and played games with them. One summer my mother was gone a lot—her sister was
dying—and I spent my days helping with the daycare children. We were all impressed
that it made the newspaper, probably the Chicago Tribune, because the Harrisons
were conservative. The Tribune was not allowed in my liberal household;
we read the Chicago Sun-Times.
Those clippings triggered
another memory. Liz and Eleanor Lee used to go around the neighborhood after
Christmas, dragging home every discarded Christmas tree they could find. This
was in the days before artificial trees so there were lots. They stashed them all
in the backyard and made a forest. Great for playing hide-and-seek—until the fire
department got wind of it and cleared out the forest as a fire hazard, which it
really was. But you can see why I wanted to live at Eleanor Lee’s house! No
such excitement at my house.
Today, as almost every day, I
don’t know whether to weep or celebrate when I read the news. But today there are
several disturbing developments—Ron DeSantis has absolutely gutted education,
particularly higher education, in Florida. Public universities cannot teach
DEI, nor anything that reflects a biased history, racism, etc. He even gets
specifics about what pronouns are to be used, though I don’t see how he can
enforce that. I hope the ACLU hops on this quickly. Many students at public
universities in that state are people of color who cannot afford private or
out-of-state schools, so they are being robbed of their only chance at a broad,
liberal education which will help them advance in the world. And we will have a
generation of people so uneducated that they are not qualified to be leaders in
government, industry, health care, all the fields vital to advancing America.
It is classic dictator tactics.
In Texas the gun news
continues to be horrifying. You probably have heard of the Sonic employee
killed in Keene, south of Fort Worth. A thirty-some-year-old man took a leak in
the back of the Sonic parking lot. When the employee went out to talk to him, a
twelve-year-old boy in the man's car grabbed an AR-15 which just happened to be handy and blew
the Sonic employee away. Dear Governor Abbott: that is not a mental health
problem; it is a problem of the availability of an assault weapon. I am not
sure what the answer is, where we will find a solution, but I know that
something like eighty-seven percent of Americans want better gun control. We do
not have to live like this. And I am ashamed that Texas leads the way in
killings.
On that note, be safe, everyone.
And do whatever you can to protest. I’m thinking hard and long about it.
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