All this superb September, I have
been working at cultivating a characteristic I lack—gratitude. For starters, trying to be grateful for the
gorgeous weather we have enjoyed most of the month. Rain when we needed it. Sunshine
and moderate temps the rest of the time.
Most years, recent ones at least,
we have had a hard freeze by this date. But the garden is still giving carrots,
broccoli, leeks, and there is still basil for pesto.
Weather gratitude is a tough slog for
an old atheist, though, because it requires an God. I was further sabotaged in
my efforts, when somebody took my good bike out of the front yard. A week later, one of the city workers brought
it back. A prank—he found it in the park.
While I was in Colorado, my back-up
bike (Rita Kauder’s old Schwinn) disappeared and was also found in the park on
top of the vending machine. I looked along the roadsides in the ditches and the
creek back of it. Thanks to Dagwood who recovered it—I am very grateful to you
and Marty Hoffman.
Nonetheless, my gratitudinal (!)
efforts are largely flummoxed by these pranks and my deep conviction that
someone who does what is right by the environment, whether or not it has
personal benefits, ought reap the reverse—respect not pranks, which, honestly feel like
ridicule.
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