Two Point Five Hours of Central Daylight Time

Dear diary,

I’m still coming down from the natural high of National Night Out. I feared its approach; but, once it arrived, it was so satisfying that I now wish it coulda gone on indefinitely. Why do fun neighborhood get-togethers have to end? Why can’t we all continue to mingle and loiter in so-&-so’s back yard, and just repurpose our former houses as storage areas, to keep the supplies for our new communal life, so that we’ll only ever need to visit our old abodes for the cause of refilling the stock when the party runs low on bratwursts.

And when winter comes, we could break the decks off our houses, and chop up the wood, and place it in a circle surrounding us, and set it on fire. That way we’d stay warm. Thus anytime anyone had to run back home to gather supplies, he or she would need to leap thru this ring of fire, and then leap back thru it again upon returning to the group; so the flames would singe the garments of him or her. This way, everyone’s clothing would become fashionably singed.

And when the bratwurst finally goes extinct, we could hunt lambs during the periods of famine, because wild lambs would always be gamboling nearby our sphere of flames. Using an archery bow, we could shoot a wooden arrow, and it would soar into the outer darkness, and, as it passes thru the fire, it would ignite; then, when arrow pierces thru the heart of the lamb, the fire would burn it, thus the creature would be both slain and cooked simultaneously.

Yet instead of having to navigate the flames again to retrieve our kill, we could invent a grappling weapon that can be cast outside like a fishing line; and it would have a fleshhook at its end, with three curved teeth.

And there would be a cauldron inside the ring of fire... Actually, more than just that: we would have a pan, a kettle, a cauldron, and a pot; and each would be filled with some sort of spicy mixture for dunking or marinating the meat.

So we’d use our castable fleshhook like a crane to lower and dip the lamb into one of these four vessels (or any combination thereof), where we’d allow it to seethe, to make its meat flavorful. But we wouldn’t burn the fat as a sacrifice to the angels; instead we would pile the fat in a heap, on one side of the circle where there’s not much foot traffic, and one of our artisans would construct a trough out of aluminum or something, and we’d have to figure out how to make the fat into soap. That way, we could wash our hands and stay clean.

During the winter, therefore, we’d eat roast lamb frequently. And sometimes we’d eat it sodden, and sometimes raw: it would depend on our mood. The important thing is that the party would never end. (I only went on a long tangent about how we’d catch and prepare food for ourselves, because I anticipated that someone would say “Your party will surely break up when the colder months arrive; and when your houses run out of groceries, you’ll all expire” — but it follows that if we hedge ourselves within a large sphere of fire, and remember to keep the premises abounding with wild lambs, we’ll do just fine.)

The only problem that I forsee giving us any real difficulties is the raising of children; because the children of our community currently belong to separate parental guardians; yet, if we all choose to live together, as one united neighbor-clan, inside a ring of fire, for the sake of keeping the festival going for all of eternity, then we’ll have to agree on which political party these kids should believe in — and the individual parents have opposing views about such things; so it might be hard to get them to agree. But I think that, in the end, people will be willing to compromise for the sake of harmony:

If our group, by way of consensus, decides ultimately to bring up its children as Republicans, then those few parents who are presently staunch Democrats will deliberate amongst themselves, saying “It is for the good of the neighborhood, and to keep the festivities going, that we shall agree to convert to the Republican ideology.”

Or, if it’s the case that most of us neighborhoodians happen to side with the rival Establishment, and thus the group officially declares that its children shall all be registered as Democrats, then any steadfast Republicans in our province shall announce:

“Tho we deeply regret that the community has made this decision, we shall nevertheless cooperate and become faithful turncoats. We shall hold our nose and hereafter vote only for Democrats. And our reason is as follows:

“The perpetual continuation of this neighborhood get-together, untroubled by political disagreement, is more important to us than maintaining free hearts and free minds. Our goal is to imitate the mariners of Tennyson’s Ulysses, who ‘ever with a frolic welcome took/ The thunder and the sunshine’; therefore let these tears that now streak our face be the last ever shed on behalf of... (etc.)”

Oh! and one last thing: If anyone ever grows ill within the confines of our flame circle — say, someone catches the common cold — it won’t be the end of the world: we’ll be able to help them. It won’t matter that we don’t have any medical professionals living in our neighborhood (I mean, if nurses or doctors ever happen to move in, then we’ll welcome them and accept their expertise thankfully; but, in the meantime, we’ll make do, without complaint) — we’ll simply keep boxed wine on hand, and it shall be Pinot Grigio. So you just drink the wine when you’re sick, and it helps you feel better.