A CIRCUMSCRIBED LIFE

Yesterday morning, far too early and before I was fully functional, a cousin whom I haven't heard from in a long time called. I don't much care for talking on the phone at the best of times, but never when I'm just waking up. My cousin said she was giving a presentation and wanted to know which of the men in a copy of a photo of two Confederate soldier brothers in uniform was our common ancestor.

She then asked how we were, and I asked how she was, and she said that she had a pacemaker but was otherwise fine and always on the go, with club meetings, her garden club and the Catholic Daughters and such. She is two years older than I am, but she must have a great deal more energy than I do.

She asked me what I was up to, and I said I was a bit of a hermit, that my socializing was confined mainly to my immediate family, children and grandchildren, an occasional lunch with a friend, going to church, and that I enjoyed the internet. She said, "I never use a computer." All right, then.

When the phone call was over, I told Tom I felt sort of sad, because my life seemed so circumscribed compared to hers. And then, I said, "Wait! I never participated in any of that sort of activity when I was young!" I am not a joiner; the only club I've ever belonged to was a literary club, but, when the quality of the books we read deteriorated, I withdrew.

I never asked my cousin where she was giving her presentation, because, as I've said, I was not yet fully functional, but I wondered afterward if the Daughters of the Confederacy was another one of her clubs.

Maybe I need a pacemaker.

ENERGY EVERYWHERE

Think Keystone Pipeline.

PAY ATTENTION NOW, LOUISIANA!

Click on the map for the larger view.

The energy and fishing industries along the Gulf of Mexico must begin now to adapt to the effects of climate change, including rising sea levels, more intense hurricanes, loss of coastal wetlands, and the biological effects of warmer water temperatures, according to a report released at a news conference Wednesday by three Louisiana State University scientists.

The report is sobering, indeed, and not just for Louisiana, but also for its message on how climate change will affect energy resources in the rest of the country.  A good many politicians and citizens in the state, and in the country, for that matter, do not believe that the practices of humans affect the climate of the earth, but rather that global warming is due to nature taking her course and will soon reverse on its own.  How much the cautions and warnings will be heeded in Louisiana is an open question because of the widespread suspicion of science.  I don't have much hope that the powers will take action as a result of the report.

The number of oil and gas platforms in the hurricane-prone area of Gulf of Mexico is astonishing, and to ride the single, fragile connection to Port Fourchon and the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port on the portions of Highway 1 that have not been elevated is to bear witness to the extreme vulnerability of the entryway for a major source of energy imports.