Notes from the tail end of a summer season

One evening, many realities:

I am amazed at my previous posts. Newspaper links? With political overtones? What has become of this Ocean blog? Let me compensate by flipping the channel back to the here-and-now of this particular blogger’s take on life: I had in a five-hour evening stretch no fewer than five encounters (email and face-to-face) that positively shook me to the core. And so, to deal expressively with the onslaught of drama, I decided to look on the Internet for a translation of a genuinelly mournful Polish poem. I did not succeed, but trust me, it's beautiful and full of pathos and drama, in the truest Eastern European fashion. Searching for poetry on the Net is a good distraction -- I would recommend it to anyone in the (momentary, because if it's enduring, go see a shrink instead) depths of despair.

Next morning, looking to others:

I visited the blogs of people I know who live in far away places. One such person resides on the Virgin Islands. She hasn’t posted in the past few days and I would be concerned that she has suffered as a result of the hurricanes, but on the other hand she comes in and out of contact, occasionally sending messages such as this:

A.W.O.L.*
*Apathetic While On Liquor
Okay.So I've been drinking instead of posting for the last month.

An ordinary person might worry when they see a note like this. Not me. She explained that rum is cheaper than water on the islands and so life sometimes takes her in that direction. Hmmm. Not exactly a cheerful route, but definitely interesting.

I also got some interesting mail from my pals in Kyoto who had been traveling in the US this past month. They write: “Thank you for telling us about American air conditioning. I took a warm shirt. My friend did not and had to buy one it was so cold.” See (Tonya!), it’s not only me. Others find this to be a chilly nation as well.

Finally, looking outside, I am in love with the bright crisp fall day. By contrast, someone said this yesterday about living in New York: “the air is so stale that even if I open all doors and windows I cannot get enough of the fresh stuff.” Now, I happen to like the particular smell that belongs to New York. It’s a combination of subway-air-creeping-up-through-the-grillwork, food stands, vents from air conditioning units and the East River. But, looking out now at the Madison sky, I am thinking that I am not appreciative enough of the Fall season in the Midwest. So, count this as a note of deep appreciation and great joy at being able to go out and sit in my favorite outdoor spot and look at the fall flowers and take in a whiff of that clear crisp air (I will choose to ignore the fact that this particular neighborhood is less than pristine as it rests on a landfill, but whatever you want to say about the garbage of the previous generation, all those additives and preservatives certainly have made the trees grow with great abandon).