(no subject)

[pallas_athena]

In DC. Sitting at my old bedroom window, looking out at the view I grew up with: roof, trees and sky.

Last night, when orkamedies asked about the significance of Labor Day in the US, the following exchange took place:

speedlime: Nobody in this country gives a shit about labor any more. Labor Day is just the official end of summer, that's its purpose.

Me: Argh, stop. This could finally be the year summer doesn't end and just goes on forever. Every year I...

Speedy: SHUT UP. I want the weather to be cool and comfortable. I do not want to be sweaty and overheated and cranky all the time! Roll on fall and winter.

Everyone else: *catatonic apathy*

I'm grateful for scoring a few extra days' worth of summer in DC: a moment more for sandals and cotton sundresses and warm nights full of the singing of crickets and cicadas. It's butterfly season, and any flowering shrub will be full of monarchs orange as embers and tiger swallowtails as big as your outstretched hand. The leaves outside my window are green and glossy; if I look down I can see a crepe myrtle in flower.

In a week I'll come back to cold, rainy, autumnal London with the year darkening towards the equinox. I have six scant days of summer left, to be spent among good friends in my beloved hometown, and I'm doing my best to make these days count.

Or, as Kurt Weill put it: