Coffee, Lilies, Inlaws and the Downfall of America

Warm coffee and fragrant lilies enchanting the house! I wonder if this combination of scents would work on skin?

There seemed only my study as a catsafe place to put the flowers. Friends got them for me, not a bouquet but a living plant of glorious morningstars, so I couldn't bear to consign them to the compost bin and spent hours breathing them in, feeling their sumptuous scent fill my head and move deep down into my lungs. It made up for the frustration of missing King King due to being too tired. Again. But even as I enjoyed their presence, I had to admit the room is way too dark for these light lovers, so found them a safe windowsill facing East. They're repaying me by filling the house with perfume.

I have things to do and an impending sense of weariness, not just about the day ahead. Wisely or not, we have invited R's parents up for Xmas and with the best will in the world - and allowing that they too, act with the best will in the world - I now wonder if this was a good idea. They test me at the top of my strength, never mind now. They have just come back from their tour of Hawaii ('I wouldn't go again,') and visiting friends close to the Mississippi. Their photos were absolutely lovely, all smiles and sunsets and cocktails, only for them to come back and dismiss Hawaii as 'too touristy.' They spoke of the terrors of St Louis and Portland, and the crazy dangers of, well, I don't know, being too generous to be sensible or something.

'They started giving tins of dogfood to homeless people with dogs...' said the MIL, with that significent expression which means give people an inch and they'll take a yard, 'so of course, suddenly the numbers of people with dogs who needed feeding shot up!'

The answer in my mouth was was Is this some great loss to the meat industry? As long as neither dogs nor humans are being mistreated, what's the issue? Personally, I'd be more worried if that food was being eaten by desperate humans. But all I did was mumble something about beloved companions because I really didn't want to start a fight five sentences into the conversation.

'Well then,' the MIL continued, 'but what about the crime? So-and-so [insert name of relative of friend unknown to us] found a homeless person just walking around his back yard!' Then it's something about the defunding of police and the presence of homeless people everywhere, as well as the decriminalisation of drugs and this general sense that America is going to Hell in a handbasket.

'Z and C hated Trump,' they continued, 'but they said his ideas were good for America.'

Here's where my memory kicked in to their last trip to the States with these buddies back in the day. No, Z and C did not 'hate' Trump, they voted for him. I'm not saying that was wrong or right, but I do recall that both they and the in-laws, who were pumped up with Brexit juice at the time, apparently roamed the Great Plains in a convoy of exuberance. It's not even about politics, it's about the prevailing wind and how it blows so hard even the past is swept away over a far horizon. I don't know whether time is merciful but it's certainly got a sense of humour.

'And do you know what I found really sad?' FIL caught the ball from his wife and ran with it, 'everywhere you see made in China.' It might occur to some sceptics as unlikely that tourists would go into endless shops across America, turn every product over and look for the label of origin, but I can state confidently that if any would bother it's this pair. 'The US has got so many natural materials. It used to be a powerhouse of manufacturing.'

Well, yes. Remember another place that used to be 'a powerhouse of manufacturing'? Unless I am confused, surely this is what happens when its cheaper to ship stuff in than build it. If you want to build it at home but it is more expensive to do so, how can people in a time of little money afford the product? If the answer is give them extra pennies by cutting taxes, that still doesn't work if everything else is going up, cos they'll save and continue to buy the cheaper option out of necessity. Meantime what happens to those people who end up homeless and mentally ill roaming around other people's lawns? If you don't want them, there has to be somewhere for them to go and that costs. So either you stash the cash and put up with the danger, or you pay. These are the very market forces that form the Holy Spirit of my inlaws' philosophy; what they want are options to stash the cash, and look after the vulnerable without spending a lot on them. I think their favoured method for this entails ensuring that those they deem unworthy do not get a single unjust advantage, even unto the price of a tin of dog food. Christ's comment 'consider the lilies, they toil not nor do they spin,' would not impress them one iota. If there was some way of making those flowers earn their keep, my inlaws would be all about it.

But they have brought excellent people into the world (and ironically, their garden is beautiful) I try to remember these things. It will cheer my husband to see his family, I must remember that that there are no perfect people,but plenty of decent ones, that I could do with practising a little forbearance. They are intensely hard-working, helpful, family loving. We will make it nice, it will all be pleasant.

I smell the coffee and the lilies together, and try to wake up.