Oh, What A Lovely Day

The exclamation is true enough in some ways, even if the temperature is very high and the humidity stifling, and one of the news items in the local paper this morning describes a motorist shooting dead another fellow who attacked him in rage who as it turns out had just been released from prison for a road rage shooting.  Riding in cars is not for the faint of heart in Florida where the rate of pedestrian deaths and fatalities in automobile accidents is second in the nation.  No, best to stay inside, and stay cool, and think pretty thoughts, as I am who at the moment is contemplating my journey to Canada next week where I will have the thrill of meeting my one month old great grandson.  A month or so ago we journeyed south of here to celebrate the first birthday of his cousin,  my great granddaughter.  Such a bubbly sweet child who warmed my heart who am not by nature drawn to very small children preferring to carry on conversation rather than making faces, squeezing rubber balls, and saying "goo-goo."  The trip to Canada will provide me with a visit as well with my granddaughter, her charming husband, both as pleasing and attractive as the parents of the great granddaughter south of us here in Florida.  And an added bonus will be my companions on this trip my two daughters who will join me after my lay-over at Logan airport in Boston, in fact one will come out to the airport upon my arrival to help me get my suitcase off the baggage carousel.  I don't think my seriously impaired balance could manage it alone.  So I will have a pleasant intimate evening at the hotel first in the restaurant and then sleeping over with one daughter and in Canada whilst that lady turns to helping out the new mother, the other daughter and I will tour some museums and other sites which will only glanced at on a previous visit.  On Friday week the big treat will be that my son the twice over grandfather will be on hand so that we can celebrate his 59th birthday.  He rarely surfaces in my life so this will definitely be a great treat.  We are staying in a hotel which promises that every room has a view of the ocean so that in turn will make the trip delightful.  One daughter warns that the temperature will fall into the sixties at night which is winter weather for us down here in Florida, so I must remember to bring garments in which I can "bundle up."  I must stop to ask rhetorically once again "who ever thought that  Charlie Beye, the class wit and dance queen of Iowa City High School, would end up not only a retired professor with a pompous title and a string of publications but a father of four, grandfather of six, and now great grandfather of two (and it's just the beginning!)?"  It's one of those days that as I look back on my association with my four children I glow with pleasure, remembering the good times and the so so times and reflecting that my wife and I were lucky that our four children were fundamentally good and noble persons who never brought on the bad times which we are always hearing about from the press and in novels.  I am fundamentally a pessimistic person so perhaps I should not end even  facetiously "God's in Heaven, all's right with the world," especially as that is such a cruel irony and so untrue when one contemplates world affairs today.