A couple of days ago it was a school night. A late school night. I have a feeling I had allowed myself a cup of coffee— I say "allowed" because in an effort to not stunt my growth too much, I limit myself to 3 or if I'm really desperate, 4 cups a week. Anyways, the house was quiet and dark, (truth be told I probably was averaging an exasperated sigh every few minutes) but other than that the house was quiet and dark except for the warm glow of the lamp next to me sitting on the sofa. (At this point in writing this post I paused to google "sofa" because it looks weird but "that's how I talk so that's just how it's going to have to be" I tell myself). I was hazily (I guess the coffee failed) trying to read and translate a letter Abigail Adams wrote to John Adams which at this exhausted, unmotivated point in my life was getting old. Earlier that day my sweet, innocent 8 AM self that was positive this would be done in a jiffy, was turning out to be so very wrong.
Was that long, maybe overly descriptive narrative—I mean anecdote really necessary? I can't tell if I've spectacularly set the mood or bored you, the reader, to death. I talk like this all the time in real life anyways ( I guess it falls under conversational) and people are always telling me to "get to the point!" but sue me for enjoying suspense!
I'll get to the point, but be warned it's kind of dark. I was reading how Abigail was describing her house as "very dirty, but no other damage has been done to it"( Adams 3). The translating to modern english part wasn't that difficult, and I glazed over it at first. It took me a second to realize that these were the effects of war, impacting everyday life— and not even that, impacting the Adams's very own home. I had assumed that the fact that they are both such large historical figures meant they would be immune to the War's immediate effects, I thought that they, like today's elite simply made meaningful decisions that only impacted other people in negative ways, while they went on with their lives in reasonable comfort, not have their homes used in war. With all the gender and racial equlity lacking in John Adam's response letter, I have no choice but to give him some ounce of respect just for letting his own home, his own life experience the consequences of the decisions he made or was a part of.
Reading that line was a little scary because it got me thinking what it would take for me to be cool with my house being used in a war, as absurd as it sounds. I imagined the room I was sitting in with no furniture and dirt on the walls and floor, and I suggest that you don't imagine the same for your house because it's not the happiest of thoughts.
I think that introduction was long not just because I can never get to the point but because what I had to say isn't something people enjoy thinking about. I think people do that in real life with their thoughts too, and sometimes it takes the literature around us or from the past to give us perspective, and allow us to consider things we've never considered before, and learn more about ourselves.
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