Morning Chill

The day we thought would never come is here at last – the morning we first light our gas fireplace, because it is reasonably chilly outside. October 8 and it is at last 60 degrees at sunrise. (It was 77 at sunrise yesterday). Jasper is sacked out in front of the fire, and Twyla (we’ve decided to name her Twyla, after the Schitt’s Creek character) is snoozling on the couch at my knees. She sleeps at night snuggled between my shoulder blades on the bed, or nose in my armpit, like a newborn baby. She is a newborn baby, really, and while I am not keen to continue this co-sleeping forever, it is sweet to have a tiny little body need mine again.

I took a surprise trip this past week. Last Wednesday, as I was talking to my boss in a 1:1 meeting, he exclaimed “Oh, my flight is canceled!” Long story short, he could find no replacement flight for a trip to a company DEI event and I ended up going in his place. It was in the Dallas area – a Hispanic Heritage Month celebration put on by our company’s new Latino affinity group. The site that threw the party is over 50% immigrants from South America – many don’t speak English – so this party was authentic. And they also did a wonderful job of recognizing each country – each table represented a country of origin for one or more of our employees. A concern among DEI folks with Hispanic Heritage Month is that to many Americans, “Hispanic” = “Mexican.” (And to be fair, by far the most immigrants from South America in the U.S. are Mexican – I looked up a bunch of statistics beforehand). But this celebration celebrated all cultures – they even had an information board with different foods and cultural celebrations for each of the countries represented by our employees.

Anyhow. There was a DJ, a taco truck, a high school mariachi band with flamenco dancers. Everyone remarked how special it is that these high schoolers are able to participate in and learn traditional performance like mariachi and flamenco in their public schools. They were very good – it was a wonderful day, and I felt very NON-Hispanic myself when the ladies from Ecuador and Honduras were continuing to dance in the tenth hour of this party and I was drooped all over a table, exhausted and barely awake. This white girl has no stamina.

(I know Heritage is missing an “e” – these people don’t speak English, they did a great job and we will forgive them a missing vowel!)

It was a quick there-and-back. I spent one night in a hotel room, and ended up locked out of it for hours because the battery card reader completely died and they had to disassemble it to get me in. I had nothing with me except my Apple Watch, so I spent a couple hours in my pajamas sitting on a pink couch in the lobby creating Memojis for each member of my family, while puzzled patrons glanced sidelong as they wandered past me to check in or buy a beer at the bar.

Now I am home. We have decorated for Halloween. My replanted backyard garden is flourishing (gotta plant in February or October, anything in between just sizzles). I have a couple more trips planned this semester, but for today I will just enjoy my cozy home, my snoozy dogs, my gas fireplace and warm coffee and spouse on the couch opposite.