Fall is my favorite season, but one that I have never taken the time to enjoy. It's always been going on in the background as I hurried to take a midterm exam or give one.
When I was an undergraduate at Binghamton, I remember pausing for a second on my way to the library, looking up at the orange hills that surrounded the college, and noticing that they were remarkable, but my political theory exam was tomorrow and I had to cram. It was October, and I was still full of good intentions that would dissipate by November, but then the leaves were gone and it was a full six months until the sun returned in upstate New York.
Now that I am temporarily freed from the academic calendar, I'm making a conscious effort to appreciate the season. Yesterday, I picked the last green tomatoes and wrapped them in newspaper to ripen the basement. I sunk pink mums into the ground. I took the time to trim the dried stems of the black-eyed susans. I've been looking up at the canopy of leaves covering the street as I drive through the town putting Ian to sleep.
I spent a good 45 minutes driving around looking at the leaves today. The nap wasn't meant to be. In the background, 1010 WINS gave me the weather on the 9s and traffic on the 10s. The headlines were all about Miers and the indictments.
I'm vaguely annoyed that this Plame thing is going to result in indictments. It's sort of like bringing down Capone with his tax violations. It's boring and trivial. What's Plame compared to the 2,000 guys that have died in this bungled war?
I haven't had a chance to read the liberal blogs yet, but I'm sure that there is a lot of crowing going on. I'm vaguely disturbed. We have three more years to go in this crippled administration, and there are no strong leaders in Congress to provide leadership. I suppose if you aren't a fan of government anyway, then this scandal is not a big deal.
Crippled government, even with incompetents at the helm, annoys me. Not appreciating this fall.