And sometimes

More often than not I write these Wednesday columns from a place of concern, disappointment, of anger, fury, sometimes fear. And shame. Such a dark time. So much that drains the spirit, that brings a person to the brink of despair. This time, my country, my “fellow Americans,” as Nixon used to say. (Quaint now to think how evil we thought this man was.)

But today I awake at the moment of dawn, when sunlight streams through the mesh of the tent. The air is cold, fresh, new, not yet breathed. I awake to the sounds of some of the 225 species of birds that make this lake their home. I awake to the soft snores of the person with whom I’ve made a life, children, a home.

And for a moment–sinking deep, oh-so-deep–into this privilege, I think: This is good. I live on an amazing planet. Isn’t it a blessing, an astonishment, a glory, that despite the cruelty and hatred, the nooses made of bread dough, the furious insanity of 3 am tweets, the 2.3 million we put in cages, despite it all, the sun comes up, the sky is cerulean, the birds sing.