2021 Life Logs, Day 287: Taking Care of Business
Date: Thursday, October 14, 2021
Weather: Sunny and Warm, Again; High Temp 73, Low Temp 56 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

All spring I was furiously writing away every day. Then summer hit and I was busy with the Goldpebbles. There was a break in August, but I spent that visiting with friends. When the Goldpebbles returned to school, I thought things would slow down. They didn’t. Finally, this week, I have had a couple of really quiet days. I spent today taking care of business matters that I should have attended to months or weeks ago. The weather was so beautiful that I even enjoyed the better part of my afternoon on the phone with Comcast. I sat patiently thinking happy thoughts while the agent on the other end spent eons of time reviewing my comcast billing record. Normally, I would have been aggravated, but I just didn’t let that happen.

What I did accomplish today was to spend a couple of hours continuing to catch up on email communication and going through a pile of things that needed to be filed away. Then, after months of not getting a $700 refund from Mass Saves from the purchase of a new on-demand hot water tank, I called and found out that the check was sent to my PO box in June. Did I throw it away or just not receive it? I don’t know, but they will send another. Next there were two hours being on hold and then wrangling with Comcast trying to figure out why my bill has increased by $70 in one year. One deal ended and the price went up. I got another deal and that deal ended and the price went up. There are no deals currently available. So, I either pay the almost $200 a month for basic cable TV and internet, or I don’t have television or internet. I’ll pay. I did a very little bit of gardening, went to the hardware store, and enjoyed time with Shadow. It was another glorious day even if it was spent just taking care of business.

Tonight, I went to a Falmouth Newcomers General Meeting. The speaker was Dr. Wayne Walker, the Carbon Program Director for Woodwell Climate Research Center. He gave us a great overview of the relationship of global forests, the importance of the carbon they store, the loss of carbon through deforestation and forest degradation, the efforts being made to collect data on this, and then the translation of the data into climate solutions. That is a lot to cover in less than hour, but he did a masterful job of making the science understandable by using real life examples that we could relate to. He came to Woodwell to do his post-doc and never left. He has spent much of the last twelve years gathering data on the trees of the Amazon basin and the role the indigenous peoples there have in holding the line on deforestation on the lands where they live. His passion for his work was contagious. He left me wanting to learn more about what is happening in the Amazon and wondering what I can do as an individual to support the important work to reverse deforestation. He made it quite clear that we need those trees!