june 22, 2002.

This morning we wandered over to Sister Silver's house to celebrate/mourn the last "Basic Black" broadcast. It turns out that we were a week early, so we played games instead.

I am really enjoying the time we've been spending with Quakers lately; the level of intelligence, thoughtfulness and dignity is just stunning. There were 6 of us playing Boggle around a small card table, and I never felt once like I needed to be on guard against peripheral vision cheating. I just knew instinctively that the people around me had simply too much self-respect to cheat. Isn't that amazing? I was playing games with people who managed to be interested in competition without being overly competitive. How often does that happen?

This leads into my second reason for enjoying the company of Quakers: the contrast with the rest of the world. I so frequently feel like everything is spinning out of control: movies, books, music, culture. Everything is so expensive & crude & wasteful. My younger cousins regularly see movies I wouldn't take my friends to. Hanging out with Quakers slows me down, reminds me that not everyone is in a decadent lockstep, intent on keeping their eyes on the prize while they plunge over the cliff.

On the way back I was positively angry just thinking about leaving this scene in two months.

A telemarketer called while I was mixing up the batter for chocolate chip cookies. I listened to her spiel while I stirred the batter, knowing that I wasn't going to buy anything but unwilling to be rude. When she stopped for breath I was ready.

"I really can't sign up for insurance on my husband's credit card without asking him first. Now let me ask you a question," I continued smoothly. "I'm making cookies, and I added one of my eggs before I creamed the butter and sugar. Is that going to be disastrous?"

She started to laugh. "No, I've done that before. It'll be a little less fluffy, that's all."

"Okay!" I said happily. "Thank you. I was going to call my mother for advice, but then you called." By now she was giggling so hard that she could barely stumble through the rest of her script.

See? Telemarketers are people too.

3 years ago today: berlinerpolitik