Lulu is currently staring at me from the porch; in fact: this porch. She often watches me from a distance, when she is not directly underfoot. She is smart, interested in just about everything that moves, and she introduced some much needed youthfulness into a house full of older people and elderly cats. In other words, if this cat were outside, she would definitely be dancing on someone’s lawn. Maybe mine. How could we know?

My grandson Panky, previously mentioned on such blogs as this one, just got his driver license. He is quite brilliant and has started college. Yes. That’s right, Poor Impulsives. Our once-youthful Colorado contingent has matured into being main characters in their own stories, and show every sign of being ready to grab the keys and head for the highway.

This summer started with a setback. I tried to study Speed Latin and discovered there’s no such thing – for me, at least – as Speed Latin. I’ve speed-studied other languages. Speed-studying American Sign Language was an absolutely fantastic way to spend the summer of 2016 until I realized my young female classmates weren’t going to vote for a woman. Last June, seven days into summer Speed Latin, I noticed my blood pressure was pounding a constant warning and I was even acting erratically, so I dropped the class and spent a month thinking caaaaaalm thoughts. Related: if you have caaaaaalm thoughts, please share them. Remembering that class still makes me feel murderous. You’re my alibi. I was with you the whole time. Anyway: everything changes. You change. I change. The way Food Network teaches us to cut onions changes. We have to accept that!

This summer, for me, ends with about 50 days to an election that will determine the course of the rest of our lives. That’s no exaggeration. We face a binary choice: we decide our individual futures vs. our individual futures are decided by other people, who don’t care about us. It’s really that simple. Do you decide what you do in your life or does someone else? It seems pretty simple to me, but clearly, I can make mistakes. Thinking takes time. Learning takes time.

Are you registered to vote? Please check – even if you think you are – at http://vote.gov.