Welcome back, members of the US House of Representatives. The world has changed since you’ve been gone.

Since the House cast its last vote, on September 19 — well before the longest government shutdown in history started — Donald Trump has brokered a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and traveled to Asia and back. The East Wing of the White House has disappeared under the president’s wrecking ball. A World Series has been won, and Taylor Swift told the globe about “The Life of a Showgirl.”

But the House has remained stubbornly clamped shut by House Speaker Mike Johnson, in a remarkable power play that mirrored the convention-busting strategies of the president to whom he owes his gavel. The Louisiana Republican justified the closure by arguing that he had nothing to negotiate over until Democrats caved.

The House is due to finally convene on Wednesday and to vote on a Senate bill to end the record-breaking impasse on its 43nd day, assuming members make it to Washington through the shutdown-inflicted chaos in commercial aviation. One Republican, Rep. Derrick Van Orden of Wisconsin, is going above and beyond, riding his Harley-Davidson motorbike all the way to DC despite frigid temperatures. “It’s going to be a little chilly, but I will do my duty,” the former Navy SEAL said in an online video.

One benefit for Johnson of leaving his lawmakers at home during the shutdown is that he kept a lid on public dissent. But calling the House back could rip the top off weeks of festering frustration and divisions, especially since the tiny GOP majority m