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welcome to Autumn

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Fukuoka, 2024.09.23

The temperature was suddenly not thirty plus today. It is the first day of Autumn, but to explain why I'm mentioning this at all: for the entire three months of summer, we had daily highs in excess of thirty degrees. I don't mind if July is baking/boiling hot. I don't mind if August is just a bit hotter than I'd like. But for the latter part of June, all of July and August, and all of September to be insanely hot .. well, I can't do this every summer that is for sure. For context:

1. The first "extremely hot day" of the year in Japan was June 12. It hit 35.2ºC.

2. The hottest day ever recorded by humans, world-wide, was July 21, 2024. The global average of 17ºC and change was fully two degrees higher than normal. Remember; that's world-wide average, so while it's always summer somewhere it's also supposed to be winter in as many places.

3. The latest-ever "extremely hot day" of the year in Tokyo was September 18. It reached 35.1ºC, this time inside Tokyo.

4. July was fully 2.2ºC hotter than the average of the thirty years prior.

The hell of it is, we knew all this was going to happen, well in advance. And, having lived it, we were robbed of the kind of summer where you can go out and enjoy yourself. Because when it's 35º or 38º, you just can't do that.

Anyway, welcome to Autumn. 2024 was the year of hell Summer, let's see how we wind this mess down.

rand()m quote

Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure is of less account.

—John Gardner