The heat will be kicking up again this weekend, not that it's ever been cool since we got back from Baxter. Last night Paul and Tom grilled steak tips, freshly harvested peppers, and fat onions. I made a green bean and new potato salad . . . but not my own potatoes, sadly; next year I hope to find space to plant a few. And with a strange self-conscious mixture of pleasure and worry, we listened to baseball: it was opening night at Fenway Park, and the Sox trounced the Orioles, just like old times.

Today I should mow grass, before the heat gets bad. I should harvest greens for freezing, and acquire some groceries. On Monday Paul starts his job and will be out of the house for an entire day. So I'm beginning to imagine the possibility of writing again, or at least of sitting in silence.