Living in Daylight

Following my wife's desertion fifteen years ago, I moved to Georgetown, where an old friend had some properties sitting around. I was given the use of a basement apartment for three years. After that, I moved to Virginia, outside the Beltway, for a year, in a group house (something I'll never do again). Then it was back into town, still in Virginia, to the basement studio which I occupied for eleven years -- the longest I've lived anywhere since moving to this area in 1980.

What they all have in common, is that they were underground.

If you live above ground, you take it for granted. But something happens when you don't. You wake up in the morning, and the sun shines in through the front windows of your house, you discover you could go for most of the day without ever turning the lights on. There is light everywhere. You actually wait until evening to switch them on.

There is no cable outlet upstairs. This is just as well, as I prefer not to have a television in my bedroom. Not this time. And since I can't stand most commercial radio, and this town's managed to ruin public radio, I'm adding the benefits of satellite radio, already in my car, to the upstairs of the house. I'm really into music. Having a dozen instruments around the house will do that. So I listen to a lot of it.

The "guest room" (formerly the den) measures seven-and-a-half by eight feet. Just enough room for a daybed with drawers underneath, with a small desk and a bookshelf.

For nearly a week, I've been away from the blogosphere. My son helped me move the big stuff with a truck late last week. Sal and I cleaned out the old place, and brought various smaller items to the new. We've got it all worked out for next weekend; she'll arrange the kitchen, and I'll handle the rest of the house. Meanwhile, I'm back at the office. The news is pretty much the same as when I left. More on that later.

But closer to home, I am no longer a serf on a share of a landowner's property. I'm the landowner, and my name is on the property. I've waited a long time for this, and -- Deo volente -- I'm never going back. Stay tuned...

(UPDATE: An extensive photo collection from the LA Times of the recovery from Katrina can be found here.)