The Collapse: Letter V

May 22, 20XX

My Dear Lucilius:

Summer is almost here. How grateful I am for it – the winters here can be a little much, but the summers always seem to make up for it. We have longer days now – the light starts at 0530 and will not fully disappear until after 2100 – so there is plenty of daylight to be out doing things.

The garden is the main focus at this time of year of course, as I am so dependent on it – but this makes for an easy task in the morning. Some mornings I will get up early and fish – truly the best time of the day – and then quickly work away in the garden to catch up.

A good day of the summer is spent preparing for winter. For years now I have worked to go through the things that I own and constantly cull them and then focus my attention on what is remaining. Maintaining The Cabin has been good for getting me out and about, using those basic skills I half learned from my father: painting, plumbing, carpentry, gardening.

The revised insulation and windows have made a great different in keeping the cabin cool in the summer from my youth of little insulation and single pane windows (remind me in some letter to speak of the retrofit), so I am able to continue my reading and contemplation and work on what ever else I can while I have the time (milk for my homemade cheese will, I suspect, soon become difficult to get. Make hay while the sun shines and all of that) in a relatively comfortable climate.

Iai and physical training fill another part of my day – mens sana in corpore sano – although I had to build an outside platform to practice Iai. The rabbits demand their own sorts of attention to round the day out.

It is a full day Lucilius, full without the trappings of modern media or entertainment and (mostly) without people. I relish it.

Your Obedient Servant,

Seneca