One simple and incredibly marvelous piece of our summer so far has been making a ring of rocks into a fire pit. The small daughter has naturally seized on this as a daily s’more opportunity. With the fairly regular rain, we’ve put up my old farmers market tent, and now we seem to be moving more and more outside. Dinner? I stir fried peas and garlic scapes and carried the skillet outside, while the girls roasted sausages. Sadly, our chocolate s’more supplies are depleted. The other morning I twisted my ankle leaping off the porch and spent the bulk of the day with my laptop outside. Since I couldn’t walk, that pretty much eliminated chores, which – while as a long-term scenario is hugely unappealing – for a July day really was an odd kind of opportunity. In summer, I’d rather live outside than in, and the smoke dispels some of the opulent bug life….

Whereas he baled hay. I baled sentences into paragraphs of prose. The meadows revealed themselves as pages, and the barn itself became the equivalent of the book where it all goes, to feed the mind and soul.

– Julia Shipley