JEFF GAUGER

Today, a dispatch from a poorly held position on bad terrain at the edge of battle. I seek reinforcements else I suffer an embarrassing rout.

The battle erupted as spring stirred recently to life from our fake Louisiana winter. The battlefield is our household thermostat.

One of the combatants is your correspondent, weakened and despondent after skirmishing for days without surcease. The other is (forgive this parenthetical interruption to delay delivery of the aching truth) my spouse. She is lovely, yes. And fierce in battle.

The distance between our armies is measured in degrees. I favor 70 at night and, deploying an index finger as infantry, so set the thermostat. “Seventy-five,” she declared before wheeling her cannon of a finger onto the battlefield.

And there we stand, separated by 5 degrees in what must be called the Battle of Fahrenheit Gap.

“I want to sleep comfortably,” I pleaded.

She countered that I’d increase our household carbon footprint twentyfold. And she invoked the dog as ally – as he lay twitching and snoring.

Oh, summer. Thou art wicked. And so very long.

Jeff Gauger is a former executive editor of The Shreveport Times who now teaches journalism at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. More at 30SecondRead.com. Send comments, anecdotes, suggestions and brickbats to jeff.gauger08@gmail.com.

THIS ARTICLE WAS PUBLISHED IN THE March 19 ISSUE OF FOCUS SB - THE INQUISITOR.