Full Moon, Full Life

It's a day off for me so I ushered my wife out the front door with her cappuccino in hand and settled down to tea, oatmeal and the Citizen in my big leather armchair. Feet up, reading light bright over my shoulder, its my quiet time at home as the Florida Keys come slowly to life. Its nice and cool these days a little more than 70 degrees, which means the windows are open, the fans are turning slowly and the air conditioning is blessedly silent. The mourning doves are cooing and there's a north wind blowing imperceptibly but thanks to it I can hear the traffic rumbling towards Key West on Highway One, even though the highway is three-quarters of a mile north of my home.The paper reports another no hope candidate running for Sheriff, as the incumbent is retiring after 40 years with the department. Some other wackos of a different stripe have killed and beheaded key deer, and all I can think is that I'm grateful they did the deed outside the jurisdiction of the Key West Police.

And that thought leads to me thinking about the call I got last evening officially informing me I was moving to dispatch night shift next week, and also telling me I get to work with the two people I most wanted to continue working with. God is in his Heaven and my job continues to be very satisfactory. Even the wife doesn't mind me going back to nights.

Flip a page, sip some tea, the false dawn illuminates the palm trees swishing outside in that imperceptible night breeze. The phone rings. Drat! What has she forgotten? "Check the moon," she says from the driver's seat of her convertible. Got to love the woman; she is just sharing her pleasure in her soft top car. So I looked at the moon and yes, it looked much better than my picture shows it.Settling back into my snug armchair with the Citizen I see Paul Krugman of the New York Times, is busy debunking the myth of Reaganomics, which is a pleasure as ever. Common sense always trumps political posturing in his columns, and he is the only economic pundit I pay attention to, not least because he is ridiculed far too often. Despite the fact that everyone knows our leaders have no idea how to lead, people who criticize them still get it in the neck from people with agendas that have no basis in reality as we live it. I heard at school yesterday stories of impending economic destruction on several and various islands as balloon payments come due and interest rates reach catastrophic heights, even as the Fed makes panic rate cuts, and evictions are on the horizon of too many peoples' marginal lives. Even though we have a fixed mortgage and "secure" government jobs I wonder where this recession will leave us. And still the state legislature yaks on about Reaganomic tax cuts as though destroying Florida's flimsy social fabric will make things better. We have to "hunker down" not just for meteorological storms around here.In the meantime, night is retreating pretty rapidly and gray skies are yielding to blue and by golly we have the prospect of a sunny day today. I may have to force myself to go for a ride, an aimless meander made aimed by the need to take some pictures to document my pleasure and remind myself that so far, life in the Keys remains good, wars evictions and global warming aside.

Then the phone rings again. "Yes dear?" and this time she has instructions on how to prepare the Geo Metro for its new owner. Apparently we have a buyer for the 43 mpg hatchback which has been replaced in our family by the 31mpg convertible. I wish the Vespa GTS were so desirable at 70mpg, but it is still for sale on Flagler Avenue.

Ah well, clearly on my day off I am under surveillance by she-who-must-be-obeyed, and its time to get moving. I have to wash the Bonneville as there was some rain on the commute this week, and I've got to scrounge some supplies for my marine corrosion class experiment at the College, and I might want to check out a matinee of "Juno" to have a few laughs a second time around at the Tropic; besides I love sneaking off to matinees when the rest of the world is busy being busy. And on and on and on.

Life, as the cartoon Calvin used to say, is just packed.