Life's Balance

Just when I cozy up with the notion that justice is relative and yen and yang are convenient constructs to explain unexplainable phenomenon, all hell breaks out. It all occurred innocently enough, with a slight miscalculation in one instance and a random act of mechanical retribution in another. As I have posted previously, I am engaged in a fight to the finish with the privet on my land. The effort extracts an exacting cost, given my advancing years and State Department level of physical conditions -- I can sit in front of a computer for hours without effort, I can sip tea and discuss issues of the day with foreign and domestic leaders, I can even fire off a pointed, even stern, memorandum. When I disengaged from the Privet War last evening, I paid little attention to the storm clouds gathering to the south. As usual, I parked the truck near the Airstream, put away my tools that prove to strike terror up and down the bark of the enemy, and joined Tinker for a light meal and some congenial conversation. As we were enjoying some Blue Bell ice cream (a flavor I have never experienced -- Banana Pudding), the "cloud came up" as we say in these parts and the place was drenched. I scampered to the Airstream, and being exhausted from the day's labor, fell into bed. The sound of the rain on the Airstream was a tonic and I was quickly asleep. Upon rising, I stepped outside the Airstream for a few moments and, upon returning, discovered that the door was securely locked. Naturally, my keys were securely locked inside the trailer. Thinking that I might have an extra key in the truck, I discovered that I had failed to roll up the window on the driver's side and the interior was soaks -- I am talking a puddle of water in the floor board. Stranded outside in a pair of gym shorts, t-shirt, and flip-flops, I had no alternative but to report all these facts to The Old Goat and Tinker. Both, in unison, quetioned me on not having a spare set of keys readily available in an accessible location. Knowing that stewing about the matter would accomplish little, I called the Airstream dealer to determine if they might have a pass key to the trailer. I am awaiting a return call now.

So, what does this have to do with justice? If all things balance, then the good fight in the Privet War, the careful planning in anticipation of leaving State and Iraq, the due diligence paid to a close financial discipline that made the truck and the Airstream and the land possible, then something has to go wrong. Flooding the truck and being locked out of the Airstream may well qualify as the balancing events that bring equilibrium to my life equation.

(The Airstream dealer telephoned to say they do not have a pass key. And, neither of Roanoke's locksmiths do Airstream locks. The cost of gaining entry into my home is mounting.)