last rose of summer

Above the 45th paralell, in October, with a thick cloud cover, six thirty A.M. is about as dark as the inside of a cow. Streetlights glare, oncoming headlights dazzle, and the rain sparkles like a million tiny cubic zirconiums in a pawn shop window. I don't mind the hour - but I do mind this drive in the darkness. Daylight savings time is a cruel trick perpetrated on decent working folk by high-falutin' Washington insiders who have never seen a sunrise without a night of debauchery behind it. Honest to Dog, have you even heard a farmer say, "Gee, I think it would be a swell idea to get up an hour earlier in the summer to save energy."? NO, because when he gets up that hour earlier, he has t turn on all the lights in the barn because it's still DARK!! And it's not as if the cows are wearing wristwatches and will contentedly adjust their milking schedules to accomodate the powers that be in Congress. Then, as if that weren't annoying enough, they have decided, in their infinite wisdom and don't-give-a-damn-what-you-peasants-want power, to extend the torture by another month. And why shouldn't they start a month earlier next year? Next thing you know, we'll be saving daylight all year long. After that they'll start - what to call it? A Daylight Emergency Bail-Out Program. They'll make the dark hours ninety minutes long and the daylight hours fourty five minutes long so you can accomplish more at work and really enjoy those hours of leisure. And Roxie will become a luddite and start throwing wooden shoes at the politicians. Care to join me in some sabbot-tage?

In spite of the dark and the rain, there were no traffic troubles on my stretch of freeeway, and I blew a raspberry at those two snails as I sruised past them at sixty five miles an hour. Rather startled the guy in the Dodge Caravan, but I gave him a bright smile and cupped my hand to my head to indicate I was on the phone, and he nodded and smiled back. I never get out the phone while I'm driving, but since I talk to the air, argue with the voices in my head, and dance to the radio while sitting down, I prefer that people who observe me think I'm actually plugged into a normal form of communication. Questioning my spirit guides at freeway speeds doesn't count as normal.

By 7 AM I had reached the college, and rosey-fingered Dawn was beginning to yawn, stretch, shower and pop in her contact lenses. By 7:15, there's enough light to enjoy the drive from college to jail. I can gaze across the mighty Columbia River and enjoy the view of the steaming paper plant in Camas Washington, and the way the housing developments have covered the hillside and ridgelines like eczema on an elbow. It's too darn bad that I can remember when this was all farm and forest out here in the hinterlands. Now, there are tickytacky apartments lining the edges of broccolli fields, and stately old farm houses surrounded by industrial parks. We humans have infested the place like termites in damp siding.

The jail is planted in a low and swampy place between two arms of a slough. I just love that word - slough. It's pronounced like stew, and that's what it makes me think of. Bits and pieces and leftovers with water added, then left alone to simmer a while. The sloughs are full of healthy and interesting wildlife. Unfortunatesly the inmates never get to enjoy any of it. If the jail built an outdoor exercise yard with bars all around and over it like the bear cage at the zoo, the inmates could get out and see the sky, and the beavers and possums and great blue herons would probably come and look at them. Maybe bring the kiddies. The herons might even toss 'em a fish. And the inmates would mooch sullenly around the enclosure, and refuse to interact with the critter spectators, just like the lions and tigers and bears. Oh my.

I did, in fact, manage to take in cookies to bribe the guards, and they were tickled to receive them. "You know how to make us happy!" one remarked. "Well," I replied, "This ain't my first rodeo. I know who's gonna save my backside if things get ugly, and it's not anyone in administration." All the guards laughed.

Next week, when I start baking for the knitting soiree, I'm going to make some extras to take in to the guards. Bribery is something that needs to be continued.

Seven more weeks to go.