The Old Blog in the Desert

Friday, 27 February 2026.

2248 hours. Mary’s unconscious in bed like a responsible adult, and I’m stalking the house like some underappreciated domestic war hero. Alex is due home after her job. I’ll go to bed after that, because apparently, I run a 24-hour bed and bathroom.

Got home from work, fueled up, washed Mary’s car, because I’m thoughtful like that, and she begged me jus’ enough to piss me off, uploaded my news article–you’re welcome, civilization–and then Buddy and I took a nap.

A heroic nap. The kind of nap a man takes when he’s one minor inconvenience away from deleting every social media account he owns and moving into the woods with a typewriter and a grudge.

I was this close to wiping my entire digital existence off the planet. But instead, I slept. Growth.

Mary got home around 1700 hours, glowing from lunch and cocktails with the school district gals at the Flowing Tide Pub. Cocktails. It’s nice to have a union and a buzz.

Anyway. The house is quiet, and I’m pacing, and Alex will roll in whenever, and I’ll shut down for the night like the last bitter employee locking up a store nobody appreciates.

Then I thought better…

Friday, 27 February 2026.

2248 hours—because nothing says “quiet domestic bliss” like a man using military time in his own kitchen.

Mary is in bed, sawing logs with the peaceful authority of a woman who has done all she intends to do with the day. I am roaming the house like a night watchman who has misplaced the lantern but kept the suspicion.

Alex is due home any minute, and I intend to remain vertical until she arrives, if only to prove I once possessed stamina.

I came home from work in the usual triumphant manner, by first stopping for gasoline and then washing Mary’s car. There is no surer way to feel like a conquering hero than to spend sixty minutes spraying road dust off a vehicle that will be dirty again by Tuesday.

After that, I loaded up my news article, which is a polite way of saying I wrestled with sentences until they agreed to sit still. Then Buddy and I took a nap.

Now, a nap is a fine thing. It is the closest a man can come to resigning from society without most of the paperwork.

I had reached that tender spiritual condition wherein a fellow considers deleting all his social media accounts and retreating to a cabin with no Wi-Fi and a reasonable supply of canned beans. The world has grown loud, opinions flying about like gnats over a sugar bowl, and I felt myself tempted to swat at every one of them.

But instead of deleting the modern town square, I did the wiser thing. I lay down, because there are battles a man can win, and there are battles best handled by unconsciousness.

Mary got home around 1700 hours, having attended what she described as “lunch” with some ladies from the school district at the Flowing Tide Pub. Now I have long observed that when educators say “lunch,” they mean “professional development with garnish.”

It appears the development included cocktails. Mary came in cheerful, wind-kissed by camaraderie, and entirely satisfied with the state of public education.

The Flowing Tide is a fine name for a place that serves drinks, for that is precisely what it produces in its patrons, a flowing tide. Mary reported that spirits were high, stories got told, and no one graded a single paper.

I shall consider that a successful summit.

So here I sit at 2248 hours, the house quiet, the dog content, my revolutionary urge against social media postponed by sleep and common sense. The daughter-in-law will be home soon, and Mary dreams the dreams of the just.

And I have learned, once again, that when the world grows too noisy to endure, a nap will often accomplish what a manifesto cannot. It is not heroic, but it is effective.

And that, in a republic, is usually enough.