Welcome, October?

I believe we’re in the process of setting a new high temperature record for today. The existing one is 87℉. In light of the temperatures, the Twin Cities Marathon, scheduled for today, has been canceled. Come midweek, high temperatures are forecast to peak in the upper 50s and low 60s. Meanwhile, we’re grateful that the air conditioning is working, in Minnesota! on October 1! We’ve reached a point where our weather is as absurd as our politics. We know what to do about each, but the question remains, will enough of US do what’s needed to turn down the heat in the atmosphere and in political capitals by turning up the heat under extremists who put personal gain ahead of community and country?

The Better Half and I stopped by to see our son in his group home midday. After the visit, we headed into the big city of Minneapolis and its suburb of St. Louis Park to visit Birchbark Books and Orvis, not in that order. Nothing was purchased at the outdoor clothing and fly fishing shop. At Birchbark, I picked up a copy of Heather Cox Richardson’s Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America. For some time I’ve been reading her Letters from an American and have been impressed. I’m looking forward to reading the book and hope her suggestions about how we get out of the state we’re in involve more than Vote. You’ll probably get exposed here from time to time to my reactions to Awakening’s content and prescriptions.

Sans segue, despite the heat and in honor of the start of Banned Books Week, I did wear my “Banned Books Club” sweatshirt to the book store and was mildly disappointed that there didn’t appear to be any specific display of banned books on the shelves or tables. I also recommenced reading Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass this morning. Later, I noted with interest, that Democracy Awakening begins with a Whitman epigram:

We have frequentlly printed the word Democracy. Yet I cannot too often repeat that it is a word the real gist of which stilll sleeps, quite unawaken’d.

Walt Whitman
Democratic Vistas, 1871

It will be interesting to watch what plays out over the next 45 days as Congress again faces the need to fund the government. I’ve just about reached the conclusion that there are no good autocrats and most Republicans are autocrats.

Democracy

By Dorianne Laux

When you’re cold—November, the streets icy and everyone you pass

homeless, Goodwill coats and Hefty bags torn up to make ponchos—

someone is always at the pay phone, hunched over the receiver

spewing winter’s germs, swollen lipped, face chapped, making the last

tired connection of the day. You keep walking to keep the cold

at bay, too cold to wait for the bus, too depressing the thought

of entering that blue light, the chilled eyes watching you decide

which seat to take: the man with one leg, his crutches bumping

the smudged window glass, the woman with her purse clutched

to her breasts like a dead child, the boy, pimpled, morose, his head

shorn, a swastika carved into the stubble, staring you down.

So you walk into the cold you know: the wind, indifferent blade,

familiar, the gold leaves heaped along the gutters. You have

a home, a house with gas heat, a toilet that flushes. You have

a credit card, cash. You could take a taxi if one would show up.

You can feel it now: why people become Republicans: Get that dog

off the street. Remove that spit and graffiti. Arrest those people huddled

on the steps of the church. If it weren’t for them you could believe in god,

in freedom, the bus would appear and open its doors, the driver dressed

in his tan uniform, pants legs creased, dapper hat: Hello Miss, watch

your step now. But you’re not a Republican. You’re only tired, hungry,

you want out of the cold. So you give up, walk back, step into line behind

the grubby vet who hides a bag of wine under his pea coat, holds out

his grimy 85 cents, takes each step slow as he pleases, releases his coins

into the box and waits as they chink down the chute, stakes out a seat

in the back and eases his body into the stained vinyl to dream

as the chips of shrapnel in his knee warm up and his good leg

flops into the aisle. And you’ll doze off, too, in a while, next to the girl

who can’t sit still, who listens to her Walkman and taps her boots

to a rhythm you can’t hear, but you can see it—when she bops

her head and her hands do a jive in the air—you can feel it

as the bus rolls on, stopping at each red light in a long wheeze,

jerking and idling, rumbling up and lurching off again.

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