Mmmmm, coffee.

No, wait, I’m supposed to be outside, walking, at 7AM. And I was, not to worry. I would not fail you, fellow blog-readers, at least I have not yet.

Nevertheless, I just love my Vivace coffee and I wanted you to know.

Virginia is humid today. If I thought there were so many birds out last Monday morning (and I did) - well, it was just a prelude. Today was a symphony. And it’s not even spring yet. And, checking in on those daffodils, I found them waiting in the soft dirt with yellowing tips. I think they will be able to hold out until March, which is a safe time to bloom.

But the branches, the barren, twisted branches still show absolutely no sign of life.

Has this become our fate? To lie in wait for a season that will elude us for weeks to come? Lately I’ve been keeping tabs on other people’s conversation topics, and I’ve been around a lot of other people, all over the country, so I think its probably true to say this: People are obsessed with weather conditions. Obsessed!

Firstly I think it’s about natural disasters - the rubbernecking impulse. And not even disasters, but any kind of extreme weather will do the trick. Secondly, it’s a conventional ice breaker, for when parents and grandparents call to see how you’re doing, or when you find yourself awkwardly placed at a dinner party. Thirdly, it’s a way for people to project their emotions:
“How’s it going?”
“It’s okay, but it’s been raining all week, so, you know…”
Typical for a Seattle-ite pretty much all the time.

Think about the word, weather. It’s a verb too, in the sense that we weather the weather, we stick it out, we persevere. Often it is said that we must “weather the storm,” but do we ever get to “weather this glorious summer day?” Of course not. Weather is by it’s very definition a thing that we suffer.

But soon, if it hasn’t happened already, another conventional national obsession is about to emerge - Election 2008. We don’t quite know yet what the tone of this summer’s campaign is going to be. There’s a chance it may be hopeful, glittering with a future that not very many people even thought possible a few months ago. There’s also the possibility of some serious and damaging domestic warfare. If we are not careful, our friends could become our enemies by the end of a serious conversation about foreign policy or government-sponsored health care.

Maybe we are all better off just sticking to the weather.