Refugio en el Norte - Day 15

It is hard to believe that I’ve been in this apartment as of today for 15 days. I’ve settled in and developed little routines with breakfast and at my desk, just making myself a home in Houston. One of the things that I do every morning is go walking. Across the street from the apartment complex is a lovely, tree-shaded neighborhood called West University Place. It’s mailing address is Houston but it is actually a small city within Houston. When I go out at 7 AM, it is just before sunrise. The air is cool and so far the humidity has not set in for Houston. I lived here for years and I know that before long I will be peeling off sweaty clothes as soon as I return from my early morning walk. But it is lovely now.

This morning I passed several houses where a gardener had mulched flower beds yesterday and the smell of the mulch was pungent and earthy. The squirrels were already out looking for breakfast and they would jump to a tree trunk and peek at me from the other side to see if I was going to keep walking. Some houses had sprinkler systems that were busy spitting water on the lawn and flower beds so sometimes I felt the a light mist on my face. There were a lot of red-breasted robins on the lawns looking for the early-bird worms. One big blue jay must have had a nest somewhere close by because he spouted warning chirps at me. Of course, I knew it wasn’t were he had flown up into the tree because jays are smart and they try to distract you from finding their nest. 

Everything seems so normal at 7 AM. How could that be when we are bracing for, but hoping against, overloading our medical system and losing too many of our citizens.