was in the neighborhood yesterday, sounding out the gas lines and marking the lawns with paint and flags. The trees are coming back.

This past winter marked a decimation of the trees on my block. The emerald ash borer had arrived and rather than wait until the plague spread the trees came down and their stumps ground down to the level of the grass. I understand, but still there is something somber about a fallen tree and the place where it stood begins to look like a smile with some of the teeth punched out.

Among the charms of living in an older city are the trees, some of whom pre-date the neighborhood and a lucky few that preceded even the people. Without them a city is just a human zoo covered with boxes, no shade, no green, no nature to break up the monotony until the horizon. When the trees disappear a little of what a place “home” goes with them. Our block was starting to look like a new suburb, houses without character, buildings without shade from the remorseless sun.

Yet the utility man was here, sounding out gas lines and painting lawns so the planters could dig without fear. New trees are coming, maples probably as they seem to be the only ones without an insect of some sort trying to destroy them. There will be noise and then there will be silence as the small trees reach for the sun and begin their life above, beyond, and still in the place where they were planted. Houses and people will go, but the trees watch over generations, sentinels of time, and free of disease or calamity will care for our children’s children.

of beauty, for sure, but there is an underlying cruelness to it all that most of us simply wish away like the whole thing is a Disney film.

No lion would actually allow a baboon to touch its cub. The “wondrous circle of life” we hear about each time a gazelle is downed by a cheetah is not so wondrous to the prey. If there are three goldfish in a bowl and one dies the other two get to eat. Without the ability to make shelters and organize ourselves we would be in the same boat ourselves.

That’s the facts.

It’s good to care for the earth. It’s good to see the moments of beauty that are all around us, the remnants of the Creator’s intent. Yet its good to be wise as well and not forget that hawks still eat rabbits, your sweet pet can turn into a snarling ball of fur, and humans, the apex of it all, kill for no reason in particular.

on TV called “Hogs Gone Wild.”

The premise is rather simple; people, and sometimes dogs, tracking down feral hogs. Apparently there are places in the US where domestic hogs have become feral and can do significant damage. They’re smart. They’re hungry. They can be dangerous. These aren’t the happy little pigs on old McDonald’s farm.

Living in the city I have little idea what I’d do if my small piece of land were to become home to a wild pig. Thankfully, though, they’re quite edible and I suppose I could have them over for dinner presuming I could catch them. Regardless, the show is fascinating in its own way, a hunting show where the people may be the prey if they’re not careful.

people used to ask me “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

They usually, of course, had a single thing in mind, like being a firefighter or a doctor or a teacher. My first thing I wanted to be when I grew up was an archaeologist. I was a little braniac even then. Over the years I’ve thought about being a solider, a musician, a teacher, a writer, a pastor, a business owner, you know the drill. Every option was good but each option was too small.

The truth is that I want to be everything that interests me and being defined by one thing may be a sign of being grown up but its also extraordinarily boring. So I’m a Priest, a musician, a writer, a husband, a caregiver, at any one given time or all of the above at any one given moment. The only thing that’s the “one” thing is following Christ, the rest is wherever my heart takes me. I guess I’m old enough not to care about whether people think I’m sufficiently grown up and wise enough to know that putting all your eggs in one basket just doesn’t work.

Have enough to eat. Have people that love you. Keep close to God. A roof over your head would be nice and the rest is gravy. Sing when you want to. Pray when you need to. Work when the work is there to be done. Love as best you can. Don’t leave a gaping hole in the earth when you’ve gone to your reward. Live at peace with heaven and your neighbors. What more is there? Only the stuff that people want you to do because it matters to them.

Maybe I’m just an old hippie without the drugs. Still I’ll die with a smile on my face.

through the night I am watched over by angels and cats and I thank God for both.

different I’d be if I was as anxious to acquire grace as I am to get my new instrument shipped. I already know the answer.