Spanish views from a small town

It's been a rainy midwinter, so far. It hasn't been cold, except yesterday morning, and only because the night before had been so clear that valley fogs formed. It has been a strange vacation, though, because our daughter has taken a job so that she can help pay for the next few months she has left of her vocational course. That means she's not home except for the holidays themselves, since the job is in Santiago, so she stays at a friend's apartment. The job is in a bookstore. Her main job is to package presents and help out customers. Her coworkers are nice people, but she is amazed at the amount of customers that could very well be labelled "karens." Sometimes because they're rude, other times because they act entitled, others because they treat the store clerks like lackeys. She's surprised at how few people are actually empathetic towards her and the others.  She's also surprised at how badly children read. Our daughter has always been a reade...

I have not been writing at all, lately. I have curled into myself, and begun a hibernation of sorts. I still go over the book I have written, detecting holes and trying to plug them, while I despair of it ever becoming something anybody wants to read. I have a painting that is sitting, waiting for the final touches that never seem to come. My thoughts refuse to leave my head. Partially, it's because the world is so messed up, so wrong, so much worse, that a small despair has crept in, that, no matter how much I, or anybody, cry out against it, nothing will change. I feel we are like ants that can do nothing about the anthill we live in because we have no say in anything that goes on. We merely continue plodding forward, building our anthill further out, ignoring the tunnels that are caving in as a consequence. So, I turn to nature, and take my walks whenever I can. Of late, that is not too often because of the weather. And the few days that are good, I have errands to run or work t...