flannel shirts

It's been so long since I've written here that I thought I might forget my password, kinda like in high school after a long winter break when you come back and can't quite recall the combination for your locker...at least, that happened to me once.

Summer has been a good experience. I guess it's gone pretty fast but when I look back over the last few months, it seems like it's been awhile.

Lots of time together with Jen, which has been wonderful. That's been one of the best parts of this summer. And I got to visit family for a couple of weeks; Jen and I went up to Minnesota and visited both of our families. My siblings were able to get home during the same time, so it was a big time family get-together. We went up to Duluth and visited my uncle and Gramma; she had just moved up there from Bismarck a couple of weeks previous. At my folks place there was some swimming in the river and the lake, lots of hanging out, some bike riding, and even a golf tournament (even though I've only played golf a handful of times it was a lot of fun...my dad works a bit during the summers at a local course; he teaches golf lessons (he's a pro) and gets to golf a lot of games).

What else...I stabbed my leg with a shard of glass. While washing dishes, a canning jar fell off the drying rack and I tried to catch it between my thigh and the cupboards below the sink. It shattered and a piece punctured my thigh. Jen took me to the hospital and a doctor dug out some little fragments of glass and also brushed a nerve with the tweezers. That resulted in a couple of weeks of nerve sensations in my leg and knee, but it's cleared up now.

Speaking of legs, the cyst in my leg was aspirated. That seemed to relieve the pain for a bit but it has since began refilling. I go back to the hospital next Friday to try the procedure again.

And now fall is coming. It's such a beautiful time of the year. When it's the middle of summer, I love the weather and the feel of the season and autumn seems so far off. And then, when this time comes, I am ready for it and wanting the cool weather, the smell of it and the feel of it. And there is that sense of change in autumn. I suppose it's wrapped up, at least in part, with memories and impressions from school--a sense of something new--experiences, people, thoughts. I would like to come across a quilted flannel shirt. I used to wear those all the time (so did some other people I know!). And they remind me of fall.

So, I'm very much feeling this change of weather, this season rolling in. Along with fresh starts and newness come feelings of personal change and understanding. It's exciting to think about all the spheres of one's life that can change and grow--relationships are a big one and there are lots of relationships--intimate, self, family, friends, worldview, ideas, and on and on.

This idea of change, growth, transformation...I guess it depends on how you look at it. As the weather cools and dusk comes more quickly, some other things seem to be static or, really, status quo. People are still imprisoned indefinitely at Guantanamo. The occupation and war in Iraq continues, while the US government broadens the war in Afghanistan and increasingly spreads it into Pakistan. Gaza is still under siege, blockaded on all borders, while Palestine in general is still under military occupation and Israeli settlements in the West Bank continue to increase. The popular uprisings in Honduras and Peru are ignored. Surveillance and harassment of activists by various government agencies, including the military, continues and seems to be growing (check out the recent case in Washington state, where a US military spy infiltrated an anti-war group in Olympia and Tacoma, which had been organizing actions disrupting the shipment of military vehicles from the ports in the area). And of course, to borrow a lyric, "the workers slave and the rich get more"--that doesn't seem to be changing with the season.

That list could go on and on as well. So could this blog post, it seems! Maybe I'll just write four long posts a year--one for every season...that's about how it worked this summer.