After yesterday's storm, today dawned bright and cloudless and beautiful. The sky is blue, the temperature is in the 70s, and sunlit branches dance in the breeze. I'm writing in my backyard, amidst hummingbirds and woodpeckers. Catbirds call, and mourning doves quarrel over birdseed. I just glimpsed a fox through the oaks and the hollies. A hawk with an enormous wingspan glided overhead a few minutes ago, the first hawk of September. We seldom see them in the summer.

Of course, nature is distracting me, so that I haven't gotten a lot of writing done so far today. But it also brings peace.

How strange to think that, legally, I own this oak tree, and others. How can I own something that's 70 feet tall and has been here for hundreds of years? Today, its leaves sparkle with sunshine, hummingbirds dart among its branches, and a woodpecker taps against its trunk.