This morning I picked up my old red shovel from beside the front door and carried it to the shed. Michal and I sat on the front steps and drank coffee in our pajamas. Neighbors brought out their bicycles and rode off. Children tried out tricycles for the first time. People in pajamas walked their dogs. Everyone smiled at each other and waved.

Later, out walking the nearby hills, we saw a red-bellied woodpecker, a white-breasted nuthatch, an eastern phoebe. Back home, under the pine trees, we sat in a sunlit chorus of cardinals, robins, blackbirds, and grackles. We know from long practice about such times of communion. And yet we are always surprised again at their power to heal.