Units of Energy

My husband was opening the electric bill.  He said to Youngest Daughter, “Do you want to know how much energy we sucked out of the environment this month!?” We try not to be wasteful, but we’re not frugal either, with electric use.

Youngest Daughter was not interested in knowing about our electric bill, but Son wanted to know why, if it was about energy use, it was not rendered in joules.  There was much back and forth between Husband and Son about kilowatt hours, joules, and what units the average electricity consumer can understand.  (We understand dollars and cents, but not so much the kilowatt hours or the joules.)

Finally, Youngest Daughter yelled, “WILL you stop being SCIENTISTS!”  Quite vehement for someone who herself has the ambition to be a microbiologist.

Son replied, “I’m not being a scientist. I’m being reasonable.”

YD shouted, “It’s the same thing!”

Here at the Common Household, we are getting our energy back and, I hope, some reason, too.  I spent the past five days preparing for and attending the memorial service.  I spent five nights recovering from my cold alone in a blissfully quiet and clean hotel room.  That hotel room was grace – an undeserved gift.  The memorial service was satisfying.

The weekend was harder on my husband.  Attending my father’s memorial service required my husband to gather two college students (Oldest Daughter and Nephew) plus our other two teenagers and drive in dead of night and sky of rain, and then get up Saturday morning to get to the church early.  Interment of ashes…. putting up with an objectionable relative’s harangue against his Jewish faith… memorial worship service…. lunch …carting teenagers around more….  dinner with relatives… remembrances and speeches.  And then he had to drive off with the same four teenagers to get them back in time for classes on Monday morning.

Now we’re all back home, rested up and diving back in where we left off.  And that means it’s time to clean off my desk and do the taxes.