Pre-Dawn Musings

It's foggy this morning here in the Charlotte area. The air is still and moist as I step out onto the back porch while the dog goes about her business. Over in the bushes a catbird squalls. It's not cool yet here in the first week of September, although a cold front approaching promises cooler weather in the next couple of days.

Summer lingers. The lawn needs mowing, but is so wet from the frequent rain that it's a chore to cut, and seems to spring back up almost overnight. The neighbors to one side of us seem to have surrendered to the grass and are apparently waiting for fall to take care of it. They're transplants from Pennsylvania with a Pittsburg Steelers banner displayed from a pole on their front porch. My sister refers to them as Yo Gabba Gabba and Yo Gabba Mama.

The quiet here in this new neighborhood is pronounced compared to our old house, sited on a main road. No tractor-trailers shake this house, as they did the old one. Going out to the mailbox isn't a case of taking your life into your hands here, and it's unlikely the mailbox will be knocked over by careless motorists as the one at the old place was more than once. And no, no one ever had the common human courtesy to stop, apologize or even leave a note; hit and run, and a murdered mailbox lying in the grass to be replaced.

Hurry up, fall. Summer's been miserable.