[Dateline 31 May 2023, for posting 9June 2023]

Summer is here—maybe not by definition, but by the reality of temperatures. When I finish my morning work in The Dungeon (writing, stock trading), I go to the sunroom with either coffee or water, and read for an hour.

The sunroom is not air conditioned, and it gets hot in the summer. A time will come, in July and August, that it will be over 90 degrees by noon and more or less unusable. Right now, however, it’s around 80 degrees at that time. Each year I make an adjustment at this time. I swivel my reading chair around to face south, put a fan in the window just a few feet away, and make do with the air flow making the room fairly comfortable.

I made that change yesterday. I would have done it a little earlier, but the fan desperately needed cleaning. That took a long time, as I had to removed the grill (which turned out to be a pain) but couldn’t fully remove it due to some clips on one end. Thus, I had to reach my hand in between the spread grills and clean it as best I could. I finished that on Monday, and used the fan for the first time this season on Tuesday.

Now, when I sit there, I’m looking out the south windows a couple of feet away, rather than the north windows on the other side of the room. What do I see? Well, the chair is low enough, and the window ledge high enough, that for most of the view, all I can see is trees. Oak trees. Most of them with 12-inch or larger diameter trunks. They are dense. The canopy is fairly solid and very little sunlight penetrates it—that’s even after thinning the trees to make our woodlot somewhat park-like. If I raise up a little, I see more of the trees and trunks. The ground is lower, and falling away.

Except for off to the right. There the ground slopes up steeply. I can see the tree line at the edge of the woods, the grassy area between the trees and the street, and the asphalt strip of the street. The grassy area isn’t solid. It is punctuated by blackberry bushes that I’ve allowed to spring up. I can even see a small pile of cuttings from this morning’s yardwork, which I plan to move to a compost pile tomorrow.

Further away, across the street, I can see the woods across the street. A hundred and fifty feet into that lot is the fort I build with my grandsons, but it’s too far back in the dense foliage and I can’t see it from the sunroom. I know it’s there, but I can’t see it.

This new view means that I can no longer see the birdfeeder on the deck; it’s now behind me. However, today I noticed that I can see the birdfeeders reflected in the south windows. It takes concentration to look at the glass and see the small reflection instead of looking straight at the south woods. I was able to see birds come and go, but the reflection wasn’t clear enough to know what type of birds they were.

I have about a month more to enjoy the south view if temperatures are normal. It might even be a little longer than that, if I change my schedule and read in the sunroom before the heat of the day warms it beyond the edges of enjoyment level. Or there will be the occasional rain day, when I can use the room all day.

So what point am I trying to make? To change your schedule according to the needs of the moment? To enjoy whichever view life gives you? To observe the panorama of views that life gives you? I suppose all of the above.

Now in my fifth year of retirement, I’ve come to enjoy my noon reading time. I’m usually up at around 6:30 a.m. and in The Dungeon working by 7:00. With only a short break for breakfast, that’s close to five hours of writing or whatever work I have to do. Reading makes a nice break. The sunroom is nice venue. I have enough books in this house to find interesting reading material for the next 50 years—no exaggeration.

So I keep busy in the sunroom. At times I even look out at the windows and simply enjoy the view.

Yes, I’m very, very close to having my taxes done. Normally I do them much earlier than this, around the end of February and first of March. But, this year at that time I was working on Preserve The Revelation and “Growing Up Too Fast”, either editing, writing, or publishing. They were done toward the end of March. I needed a break, so didn’t begin them for a few days, maybe around April 3.

I won’t take a long time explaining this. Our taxes are complicated. Our stock trading partnership, my writing sole proprietorship, my work, Lynda’s social security. It makes for lots of forms, and worksheets from the instructions. I have Excel spreadsheets built to do the calculations. All I have to do is come with the W-2, the 1099s, and deductions statements. This year my paperwork was well organized. I also have to check my spreadsheets against the forms and instructions for the tax year, in case something has changed.

I had the Federal done, and began working on the State. My spreadsheet links the State to the Federal, and rounds the Federal amounts to 00 cents, as Arkansas requires. Everything flows quickly from the Federal to the State. But, at the last minute, the State wanted me to attach Federal form 8889. I scrambled, and found that form 8889 is REQUIRED if you have an active Health Savings Account, as I do. I’d never heard of this before, but apparently I should have filed it every year since I had the HSA, about six or seven years. Since my HSA is funded with pre-tax dollars, I have no tax consequences. However, I still have to file it. I had two stressful days learning about and then completing Form 8889. But it’s done.

The status is: My Federal and State forms are done, printed, signed, copies, and mailed. My partnership calcs are done, the forms printed, and signed. All except for one form that I forgot about printing. I couldn’t do it at work today, so I’ll do it at home this evening and mail it all Monday. I also do taxes for my mother-in-law. I did the calcs on them last night, concluded she didn’t owe any taxes, and so decided to set them aside for a couple of days and take a break.

During these last two weeks, engrossed in taxes as I’ve been, I’ve done almost nothing for writing. That should change this weekend.