It’s 11 PM. The temerature outside is in the high ’70s – several degrees higher than the pool temperature, which is a bracing 74 degrees.

A soft breeze from the east rustles the palm trees as I swish myself around the pool. Is tonight the last night of the season? Can I squeeze one more night of summer out of the year? Just in case, I’ve got the pineapple patio lights and the tiki bar lights on to provide a festive background as surf music – this one is called “Fadeaway” by Laika and the Cosmonauts – plays softly in the background.

Hmm…tomorrow it’s only supposed to get into the ’70s and then into the ’50s tomorrow night, so I figure pool-wise I’m living on borrowed time.

So even though the water surrounds me in a chill I feel I have to try and squeeze whatever is left of the season around me.

I have a fatalistic sense of things around me this night.

Lots of people out there are focused on the upcoming election but I have a hard time justifying voting for one party over another – what difference does it really make to me? I work 70+ hours a week feeding work that should rightfully stay between the Atlantic and Pacific over to India, and no one seems to give one damned skippy about it. My Goodboys friends wonder what has happened to me, but I’m just busting my ass (and Tracey too) trying to get rid of the last of our credit card debt. In two days I turn 53, but in some – no, make that many – ways I feel ten years older and a ghost floating through a world that has passed me by. I don’t get what this world has become – I don’t get the cheapening of life, the coarseness of political discourse, the whole “us” vs. “them” mentality of left and right, Democrat and Republican, and liberal and conservative. I’m tired of all the fighting. To hell with Wall Street and Washington – they can all go to hell for all I care. This country is splitting apart at the seams, but it’s a country I feel nothing in common with in any way, anyways. All I do is I try to do my morning, noon, and evening religious offices, and pray to a God I can only hope sympathizes with the battered state of my soul and try to be the best worker, husband, servant of Christ, provider of everything rabbit, and human being I possibly can.

But that’s not a concern to me right now. For right now all I wish is that I had the money to invest in a pool heater to keep my water at a toasty 85 degrees so I could splash around under the lovely 3/4 moon that shines above – a 3/4 moon that longingly reaches out to me in the silvery diamonds reflecting on the floor of the pool. This shouldn’t shock anyone. I know I have it a gazillion times better than 85% of the people on this earth – and there are probably people reading this post who resent the fact that, amidst all the suffering and misery of this world, all I’m concerned about is the temperature of my pool water – but that’s not where my head is at this night. I remain a leaf on a windy day, a cork on the ocean, a rock in a landslide.

Those who resent my complaining may have a point, but where else can I seek peace? Where else can I seek the soft whisper of God’s voice calming the waves that continually batter against the shore of my soul? Shouldn’t a guy be allowed to find some peace? Somewhere? Anywhere?

So it’s a night to enjoy the quiet comfort of a chilled glass of Pinot Grigio outside under a bright moon and a slowly chilling pool.

The palm trees rustle.

The surf music plays.

The rabbits enjoy their bedtime carrots.

The rest of the world be damned. I’m only looking for a bit of peace in my soul.

Oh, did I mention both Daisuke Matsuzaka and Jonathan Papelbon looked pretty damned good against those Tampa Bay Rays?