108 Degrees
It was 108, today. 108!
For most folks that's hot. For Portlanders, well, it's Hell. A good number of folks here don't have air conditioning. In a normal summer, one doesn't need it but a few days; so when the mercury rises past the century mark people get down right cranky. No doubt our vast majority of liberals here are going to be singing the global warming song. I think this might have been the only market where Al Gore's movie actually made money.
I'm feeling a tad guilty as I didn't go to mass at lunch time. I try to make it to daily mass a few times a week, but especially on Friday. My excuse? It was too hot to walk the few blocks I have to walk to get to St. Michaels. Oh, at the time it was easy to rationalize. I mean, who wants to go back to work all sweaty. Yet a part of me feels like Peter falling asleep on the job in the garden. It's not something that I'll spend a great deal of time agonizing over, but it does give me good cause to pause and reflect on how easy it is to choose the wide road and avoid the difficulties of the narrow gate.
The heat is also a good reminder of how blessed I am. We have air conditioning. It's 10:00pm and still 95 degrees. Across the city there are thousands who are suffering, tonight. There are elderly who are alone, perspiring profusely, and pondering if this will be the event that takes them from this life. Out there, a mom in a cheap apartment tries to comfort her new born who has grown cranky from the oppressive temperature. A young couple is fighting somewhere; the ever present hot exaserbating their troubled relationship. A homeless man stuggles to push his overloaded shopping cart to a safe place already dehydrated from the alcohol.
My prayers tonight are for those who are less fortunate. I wish I could invite them all into our little two-bedroom aparment and give them all a cool drink of water and a kind word. Instead, I offer my prayers for their well being, and I offer the Lord my own shame for taking the easy road today by avoiding my opportunity to accept His invitation to have a meal with Him in the Eucharist because it was too hot. It seem like such a poor excuse, now.
It will be cooler tomorrow. Our high temperature is expected to be 104.
For most folks that's hot. For Portlanders, well, it's Hell. A good number of folks here don't have air conditioning. In a normal summer, one doesn't need it but a few days; so when the mercury rises past the century mark people get down right cranky. No doubt our vast majority of liberals here are going to be singing the global warming song. I think this might have been the only market where Al Gore's movie actually made money.
I'm feeling a tad guilty as I didn't go to mass at lunch time. I try to make it to daily mass a few times a week, but especially on Friday. My excuse? It was too hot to walk the few blocks I have to walk to get to St. Michaels. Oh, at the time it was easy to rationalize. I mean, who wants to go back to work all sweaty. Yet a part of me feels like Peter falling asleep on the job in the garden. It's not something that I'll spend a great deal of time agonizing over, but it does give me good cause to pause and reflect on how easy it is to choose the wide road and avoid the difficulties of the narrow gate.
The heat is also a good reminder of how blessed I am. We have air conditioning. It's 10:00pm and still 95 degrees. Across the city there are thousands who are suffering, tonight. There are elderly who are alone, perspiring profusely, and pondering if this will be the event that takes them from this life. Out there, a mom in a cheap apartment tries to comfort her new born who has grown cranky from the oppressive temperature. A young couple is fighting somewhere; the ever present hot exaserbating their troubled relationship. A homeless man stuggles to push his overloaded shopping cart to a safe place already dehydrated from the alcohol.
My prayers tonight are for those who are less fortunate. I wish I could invite them all into our little two-bedroom aparment and give them all a cool drink of water and a kind word. Instead, I offer my prayers for their well being, and I offer the Lord my own shame for taking the easy road today by avoiding my opportunity to accept His invitation to have a meal with Him in the Eucharist because it was too hot. It seem like such a poor excuse, now.
It will be cooler tomorrow. Our high temperature is expected to be 104.
posted by David Jackson | 10:05 PM
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