Waiting for a Planning Commission meeting, I end up with an odd half hour and swim in the lake. What does ‘planning’ mean anymore, anyway? It’s enough that I grabbed my swimsuit on the way out the door.

My life feels like an intersection between work days, rising Covid cases, an upcoming book release, and the very real stories of my daughters.

The world, indeed, goes on. My daughter and friend swim in the same lake in the early afternoon. When I return that evening, we stand on the back porch, eating cucumbers and avocado toast, talking. My oldest returns after dinner out with a coworker who’s packing up and moving elsewhere, in a story full of switchbacks.

My youngest drives us up a nearby hill. The sun has just lowered below the horizon, and the sky is swirled with rose-petal pink and hues of blue, golden at the horizon. We walk up a short path for a better view, and she leads the way into a field of goldenrod. The crickets sing madly. A mosquito lands on my upper arm and sinks its proboscis into my skin. My daughters are both talking. The mosquito swells with a drop of my blood, then disappears into the fattening glooming.

As we head home, my daughter drives with the windows open, one elbow cocked over the door. I love to drive, she tells me, her eyes on the road.