Yep

Every day, especially on Thursdays, I thank my lucky stars for how fortunate I am in almost every way.

My life is an embarrassment of riches: I have my health; I’m loved by people I love; I have a safe and stable place to lay my head every night and all the food in my cupboard and refrigerator than I ever need; I have the best dog in the world and a job that I like pretty well which pays me more than adequately; in summertime, my days are filled with yoga, meditation, reading fiction, dining al fresco on my back porch with my darling wife, taking naps in the afternoon, swimming in the lake, smoking weed, and riding my bike all around what is probably the most beautiful city in America; plus, I never have to worry about being killed by the police.

Life is fucking good.

So, I have a special responsibility to be grateful for my good fortune and to behave in ways that recognizes this and which, insofar as I am able, makes the world better for those less fortunate than me, or, at the very least, doesn’t contribute to making it harder for them in any way.

I have it good, so I’m obligated to be good.

This doesn’t mean that I can never break any rules, like jumping into the lake next to a sign that says, “No swimming or diving,” or hanging out at night in a park that closes at dusk, but it does mean it’s incumbent upon me to be mindful and aware and as kind and understanding as I can be and to pick up after myself—a small price, after all, for the benefits which accrue to me given my race, gender, age, education, and a host of other qualities that just happened to come my way, no effort on my part required.

Nobody’s perfect, least of all me, but the better I am, the better.

Meteoric

I only saw a single shooting star, but given the state of everything these days, that was plenty. 

I’m all about lowered expectations during the pandemic, so I’ll give my experience of this year’s Perseid meteor shower a solid “A-plus;” I made my wish as a glowing ember streaked across the night sky and it came true right then and there, with a perfect evening for a bike ride, a roaring fire, and more of the usual suspects social distancing together than have assembled for months.

As strange as this year has been, the earth still makes its way through the through a debris cloud left behind by the giant comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle right on schedule; the Universe doesn’t care about any turmoil in the human world; gravity keeps on doing its thing and our planet’s elliptical path around our star maintains its yearly routine, one that enables homo sapiens on this third rock from the Sun to gaze upwards on August evenings and be rewarded with a bit of celestial magic that is really just dust on fire.

And if that’s not a metaphor for life, I don’t know what is: what are our petty little existences but energized dust lit up for an instant as we self-immolate in our planet’s atmosphere, right?

Of course, we get to do all sorts of things before we’re extinguished, like relive past versions of ourselves by swinging balls of light around, or amaze our friends and new acquaintances with feats of strength, or just lie on our back allowing eyes to adjust in order to see as much of the vastness as possible in hopes of being surprised by one’s hopes being fulfilled even once.

It’s been what seems a long time since I found myself miles from home and reasonably convoluted at midnight; my bike, though, remembers the way and how it’s done; you just wish upon a falling star and keep on pedaling till your house shows up,

Simple

What a difference a year makes.

In 2019, on the occasion of the first Thursday in August, which for more than a decade, has been an occasion to mark another occasion, something like a hundred bike-riding revelers gathered in Seattle’s favorite old-growth tree city park to load up on grain alcohol-infused juice boxes before throwing themselves down a basketball court-sized sheet of plastic amidst countless plastic glowstix and wrestling with each other in a tub of vegan-friendly goo.

In 2020, barely a handful of riders pedaled to the same location, simply to mark the occasion by standing around a fire quietly drinking beer and reflecting on the efficacy of vaccine trials and the prospect of someday being able to enjoy the sort of grand shenanigans that are mere memories these days in the days of the pandemic.

Nonetheless, a reasonably good time was had by all, which does beget the question, “Why not?”

It’s hard to understand how quickly things have changed and one can’t help wondering where everyone has gotten to and if they will someday return.

I, for one, keep doing pretty much the same things I’ve always done, albeit with a bandana wrapped around my face, so I’m a little bit surprised to see how the behaviors of friends, acquaintances, and relative strangers has changed so much.  I’m sure they have better things to do, which is just another illustration of how easily I’m satisfied by inertia and habit.

Still, it’s still grand be outside on a cool summer’s evening in the Pacific Northwest and while it’s too bad you aren’t able to enjoy the wonderful excess that has characterized the date since back in the early days of the Obama administration, these days, it’s almost, relatively speaking, just as excessive to be hanging out with three or four people who don’t live in the same house as you do.

A person can get used to almost anything; but almost anything’s unusual via bike.