Tag: Sustainability

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Living in Society

Where We Live

Autumn Blaze maple tree.

When we moved to Big Grove Township, I took out a map and compass and drew a circle to indicate where we wanted to live after beginning work on the southwest side of Cedar Rapids. Having lived in the city previously, returning there was not a positive option. We looked at potential homes within the circle, including a couple in Williamsburg — a good distance from work. The housing market was tight in 1993, with homes sometimes selling the day they went on the market. We ended up buying the lot where we built our home, and for multiple reasons, it has been a good setting for our lives.

My commute to work was 18 miles or 25 minutes. Why would I live so far from work? I wanted to maintain a separation between work and my family and creative life. Back then, I embraced the automobile culture and that aided my decision. Early on, I learned the importance of a buffer between my two lives.

Until entering the military I had lived in a city or community that either was walkable or had reliable, inexpensive public transportation. In Army basic training and officer candidate school I lived in a barracks with everyone else. When I received my commission, I moved to officer quarters at Fort Benning. I could still walk to classes yet when I arrived in Germany, I would need a vehicle. I bought a yellow pickup truck in Georgia and had the military ship it to Europe.

When I arrived in Mainz in 1976, the kaserne where the troops were stationed was in another city called Mainz-Gonsenheim. Martin Luther King Village, where officers, non-commissioned officers, and their families were housed was too far away to walk to work. Some of my fellow officers who were married did not care to live in military housing at all and picked rentals in other nearby villages. They found separation from the military was good for their family life. It is a lesson that stuck with me.

I have been cognizant of the difference between city and country living for most of my adult life. In many ways, increasingly in the age of internet communications and mobile devices, city vs. country is a false distinction. That is particularly true in Iowa where country folk trade grain internationally and need to stay in touch with markets all over the globe. What is the difference between Wall Street and Martelle? Not as much as people would have us believe.

There is something to be said for the automobile culture that dominates rural areas. As a gardener, I need supplies from multiple vendors, including soil mix near Tipton, and fertilizer near Monticello. Driving to these vendors saves money in terms of a potential dealer mark up on the items. Similarly, if I need groceries, in a vehicle I can bypass the local grocer and drive to a store more suited to my needs. We rely upon having a vehicle in a small, rural subdivision.

Our neighborhood is walkable, if by that one means enjoying the solitude of nature. I’ve been talking a daily walk ever since I could no longer jog on the trail. Even at sunrise I encounter others I know who walk or jog on the trail, so there is a sense of society. Some of those folks have been neighbors since we arrived in Big Grove Township in 1993. Having a nearby state park is not really the meaning of having a walkable community.

In Germany I needed a vehicle to get to work. At the same time, I lived near the main railway station and all of downtown Mainz was within walking distance. When I had free time, I would walk by myself or with a friend all the way down to the thousand-year-old Mainz Cathedral or to the opera house. If I needed groceries yet didn’t want the the American fare at the post exchange, a German grocer was located near the train station. I did not have an intimate relationship with the city, yet I learned to wear proper walking shoes there.

My maternal grandmother lived in downtown Davenport where she could walk to get most things she needed, well into her 80s. She got basic groceries at the Walgreens near her apartment. She continued to work as she aged and there were several work sites near her apartment. Growing up on a farm in rural Minnesota, the family took the horse and wagon to town when they needed something. Otherwise they made do in place, without leaving the property. She brought that farm culture with her to living in a large city.

The draw a circle on a map method of picking a place to live worked out for us. Now that I retired, we live in a quiet, safe place where two or three trips a week to town is sufficient. If I didn’t have a Powerball gambling habit, there would be less trips. I retain the automobile culture, yet inexpensive delivery of almost every commodity needed for living is readily available. Once we cut loose from the vehicles, I found life is even more livable than it is with them. That is important when picking where to live.

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Living in Society

Living with AI

Analog sunrise on the state park trail.

It seems clear we will have to live with artificial intelligence, like it or not. As Scottish data scientist and senior researcher at the University of Oxford Hannah Ritchie posted on Monday, “AI could really change things. It has the potential to not only improve the accuracy of (weather) forecasts but also to run them more quickly and efficiently. That then makes them better and cheaper.” Okay… I’m listening.

At the pre-2025 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, weather predicting got very good. I could look at the weather radar on my computer, identify where the storms were going and with what intensity, and then figure out how much time I had to mow before rain started. Because of great weather forecasting, I was almost never wrong. How much better can it get? With the administration’s cuts to NOAA, the machines may be necessary to continue progress, and according to Ritchie, it looks like they have the potential.

For me, the AI game changer has been organizing basic life tasks. On Oct. 10, I wrote:

I’m four days in using AI to help plan a more productive day. With its “Balanced Day Plan,” I immediately eliminated a background concern that there is too much to do and not enough time in which to do it. I am fond of the saying an air traffic controller can only land one airplane at a time. So it is with tasks I have before me. AI finds a way to get it all into a day. If it can’t, it tells me. This serves as a stress reliever, helping me focus on the task at hand, and I do a better job with it. For example, I need to drink more water to stay hydrated. …This pursuit is just getting started and my best hope for AI lies herein.

From there, my life has taken wing. It is curious what a tonic eliminating worries can be. While AI has been great at getting my organizational juices flowing, I have already come to a high water mark with the machine, and from here I can proceed on my own.

I took the “Balanced Daily Plan” and translated it into language that fits in my world. I updated my existing, pre-AI Daily Plan to include the most salient points identified by AI. I was concerned about adequate hydration, so I highlighted in blue some words where my new hydration schedule would occur. I generalized the pomodoro work block process, with three blocks in the morning and two in the afternoon. I was careful to create plenty of space to do necessary tasks and recover once they were done. I decided to move to the kitchen about 3 p.m. and work there until dinnertime. AI helped me to recognize how a day could be structured, something I was not doing with any effectiveness on my own. Now that I re-wrote my regular schedule, I am free to go on my own, and will.

During the pandemic, stuff had a way of accumulating without being adequately addressed. This includes all of the areas in which I work at home. Think of the basics: food, shelter, and clothing. Each of them was a disorganized space where I had no idea what was possible. I got bogged down by stuff accumulated in each area. To get started, I queried AI about the vast quantity of t-shirts scattered throughout the house. The machine result helped organize the collection enough to know what I could be wearing for different purposes, and store the ones not in immediate use in labeled boxes. That had been hanging over me, yet by using AI to do the project I relieved stress and worry about it.

From here it became easier. I cleaned out the refrigerator and found a vast quantity of pickled items. Unaware, I overestimated how many pickles I could eat in a year. The pickled vegetable situation got away from me. I did not use AI for this sorting. The t-shirt project had primed the pump for any type of organizational project. Now I look for those projects to fill some of the space outside pomodoro blocks. This will apply to my workshop, writing space, the kitchen, garden, and all of the defined spaces in our home. This is what I mean when I say my life has taken wing.

AI is not going away. I expect to use it as a tool when I find a project puzzling, poorly designed, or inadequately resourced. No one knows the future of AI despite all the public rhetoric. It is far from easy to use and keeps crashing on what I believe are easy tasks. For the time being, it is one more tool in my workshop to help make life better. That and a few pickles to snack on and I can make it a day.

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Living in Society

Eating Alone – Mexican Fare

Home Made Tacos

When my spouse is away, I haul a small boombox upstairs and crank the volume up. I find myself digging out old compact disks and audio cassette tapes, listening to Iowa Public Radio more, and tuning into the local classical music station. Classical music is more interesting on the radio than in other media because of the announcer. While I wouldn’t call it “going wild,” it’s as wild as I get regarding music these days.

How I prepare Mexican food is different when she is away. When cooking for two I avoid use of ingredients that contain capsaicin, a.k.a. 8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide. According to Wikipedia:

Capsaicin is an active component of chili peppers, which are plants belonging to the genus Capsicum. It is a potent irritant for mammals, including humans, for which it produces a sensation of burning in any tissue with which it comes into contact. Capsaicin and several related amides (capsaicinoids) are produced as secondary metabolites by chili peppers, likely as deterrents against eating by mammals and against the growth of fungi. Pure capsaicin is a hydrophobic, colorless, highly pungent (i.e., spicy) crystalline solid.

It’s hot. Lots of people don’t care for it or are allergic to it, including family members.

When we are together I get my spice by adding hot sauce as a condiment. When I cook and dine alone, I’m free to add it while cooking. Mexican fare is flexible in preparation so the lack of heat while cooking has not been an issue. My process for using chili peppers continues to change. I wrote about the basics in 2019:

The recipe for hot sauce evolved over time from one Juan San Miguel explained in 1977 when we both garrisoned in Mainz, Germany. Those were days before a four-foot section of assorted hot sauces became standard in supermarkets.

I lost contact with him yet the recipe persists. It is a rare day when there is no hot sauce in the ice box.

We carried the condiment in plastic milk jugs and put it on our army rations while on maneuvers in the Fulda Gap. It made our eyes water and changed regular food into edible fire. We laughed a lot in that peace-time army… and ate sandwiches of bread and hot sauce. I continue to make it mostly the way Juan taught me. (Meditation on Hot Sauce, Oct. 20, 2019, Paul Deaton).

This week included making hot pepper paste, dehydrating Cayenne peppers for red chili flakes, blending jars of powdered hot peppers from the pantry to use in shakers, and using a fresh jalapeno when making enchiladas. I found less is more: reducing the number of preparations to just a few that will be used. October is the month to do this as hot peppers are the most abundant late harvesting vegetable. Getting all this kitchen work done while she is gone is a plus. Even I had to wear a KN-95 face mask while mixing the powdered hot peppers. I should be wearing a pair of surgical gloves yet don’t and my hands sting for several hours after preparing fresh chilies. I know I’m alive.

A typical difference when I am eating alone is taco filling. The main recipe I use is a blend of black beans, kale, onions, garlic, bell peppers, tomato sauce and Mexican oregano. When cooking alone, instead of tomato sauce, I make a sauce of dried guajillo chilies. These chilies are not that hot but when allergic to capsaicin, any amount is too much.

Enchiladas are in the refrigerator waiting to bake for dinner. Tuesday is for tacos when I’ll use fresh chilies. I am not a heat nut, yet have a more developed use of chilies grown in the garden than most Iowans. The use of chilies characterizes my kitchen-garden.

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Home Life

End of the Season

Lake Macbride on Oct. 24, 2025.

We have been expecting the first hard frost. I was awake when it hit in the wee hours of Friday morning. The average date is Oct. 13, so we are 11 days behind. Nothing to say about that other than that is where the day began.

It was chilly indoors so I turned on the furnace when I couldn’t stop shivering. I set the thermostat at 65 degrees and that took care of the shivers. When I went for my morning walk I donned my winter coat and needed it. I saw the sunrise light show from the dining room windows, yet had things to do and didn’t get out until daylight. The way light falls on the trail is always a show in its own right.

I felt like crap when I woke. It is likely the COVID vaccination on Thursday. By evening I felt myself again. The main accomplishment this week was going through clothing to see what I want to keep and what goes to the thrift store. I reduced the number of blue blazers to the one that fit best. I kept only one pair of slacks to go with it. The others will go into the back seat of the car with other clothing donations until I drive by the drop off point.

On the to-do list was fix the short garden hose attached to the spigot in back. For whatever reason the hose washers came up missing and I got quite a spray yesterday. I found two new ones in the first drawer I opened. Hose washers are not something for which to make a special trip to the hardware store. The main hose is stored in the garage until spring.

I aired the front left tire on the John Deere, stored the grass catcher for winter, and fueled. I mowed one last time for the season. It went quickly and looked okay when finished. That tire needs replacing so I backed the tractor into the garage so I can get at it, jack the front end up, and remove the tire and rim. The thrift store is not far from the tire shop, so I’ll put the old one in the back seat so it can be dropped off on the same trip.

Before sunrise I made a dish of enchiladas. I’m not sure when I will bake them, yet likely over the weekend. The refrigerator and pantry are full of food so there are plenty of meal options. Thank goodness my Social Security pays for most basic stuff of living.

Now that the garden is finished attention turns to the two dead ash trees. My chainsaw is kaput so I need to get to the hardware store and see about a new one. I noticed the Ace Hardware in Mount Vernon is a Stihl dealer. I’ll likely start there and see where it takes me. I hate the expense for a tool to use two or three times a year. However it is more expensive to pay a tree service to remove dead trees.

It has been quiet in the neighborhood. As if the whole world is preparing for winter and can’t be bothered. Days like this I notice my mobile device usage is pretty low. There is plenty of work to do as the season turns in the real world.

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Living in Society

Eating Alone – The Refrigerator

Refrigerator the day after my spouse left on a trip.

This week I am eating alone because my spouse left on a trip to visit her sister. The first thing to do was go through the refrigerator and study the contents.

There were two leftover servings of tofu-vegetable stir fry and a jar of chili. That’s three meals right away. I made both dishes to share for dinner, and leftovers should be equally good.

There are a dozen eggs, fluid milk, butter, sour cream, cheeses, pickles, three kinds of bread — a commercial loaf, sour dough, and locally baked burger buns. The two drawers have storage apples in one, and an array of fresh vegetables in the other. Nothing to compost here as we keep the veg moving. I need to use the last two garden eggplants soon.

The bottom drawer has loads of fresh greens, uncooked flour tortillas, and more cheese. The doors have a partly empty carton of oat milk, a gallon jug of skimmed cow’s milk, the rest of a half gallon of fresh apple cider, and countless jars of mustard, ketchup, sauces and condiments. We are well-stocked!

To sum it up, there are three easy meals of leftovers and diverse sandwich-makings. Eggplant lasagna or something similar is in the works. Tacos are always possible. I have three small heads of Romaine lettuce, so a big salad for dinner could be done. Without doing much of anything, I’m halfway through the solitary eating period. I needed to go to the grocer.

My shopping trip was typical. I spent time in the fresh fruit and vegetable section studying what was available and comparing it to what we need. I bought some grape tomatoes on special pricing, a bag of red radishes, and a bunch of green onions. I get organic celery here because celery is at the top of the list of pesticide-laden vegetables. Buying organic celery makes sense.

In the specialty cheese section I bought some Wisconsin-made Gruyère to melt on something. Next I went to the cereal aisle and added a small box of Post Grape Nuts to the cart. I had been reading about using it as a crunchy topping on salads and thought I would try it. I also got a box of store-brand Raisin Bran because it was on special pricing. (I know! Impulse purchase). I picked out a big bag of Halloween candy for trick or treaters and everything else I got was replenishing staples in the pantry.

My spouse is vegan, so the dairy is for me. That I remain an ovo-lacto vegetarian sets me on a deliberate path to separate us in eating. I learned to make delicious vegan meals we share. The difference is also part of why I sometimes cook for myself even when she is around.

So I have a plan to eat alone this week. It is essential work for the period of physical separation. Because this is no different from any other day, it suggests I eat alone often. I do.

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Living in Society

Eating Alone

Photo by Amateur Hub on Pexels.com

Most of the meals I take are eaten alone. It’s just the way my spouse and my schedules work out. I am an early riser and have coffee around 3 a.m. with breakfast a couple of hours later. Lunch is not really a meal in our house. I graze bits and nobs throughout the day, maybe warm some leftovers or make a sandwich, and keep track of calories consumed. We plan and share dinner, which usually involves shopping, food preparation, and cooking. Sometimes I cook and sometimes we both cook a meal. Until I read Deborah Madison and Patrick McFarlin’s book What we eat when we eat alone, I had not given much thought to eating alone.

Eating is fundamental not only to survival and health, but also to how humans organize their social lives. Eating together with others is often seen as the healthy ideal, while eating alone is highlighted as a risk factor for negative health outcomes, especially among older adults. (“The impact of eating alone on food intake and everyday eating routines: A cross-sectional study of community-living 70- to 75-year-olds in Sweden,” by Amanda Björnwall, Patricia Eustachio Colombo, et. al. Aug. 14, 2024).

Healthy ideal or not, I feel set in my ways. As I age, it seems likely I will continue to eat more meals alone than together. Well, maybe until I move to a facility where residents take all of their meals in a group setting. We increasingly don’t like talking about those institutions as we age.

My spouse is heading over to stay with her sister for a week to ten days. This will give me an opportunity to consider all that eating alone means. From the gitgo some questions come to mind.

  • Do I cook a meal or grab something already prepared?
  • Are cooking alone and eating alone the same thing?
  • Why is what I eat different when eating alone?
  • What role do restaurants and food outlets play in eating alone?
  • Eating in the car. What’s that about?
  • How do I shop differently to eat alone?
  • What role do leftovers play in eating alone?

This could be a rich field of inquiry. As of this writing, I don’t know where I am going with this. Stay tuned to find out.

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Living in Society

Tuesday Miscellany

After moon rise and before sunrise on the state park trail.

Like with many Americans, a lot is on my mind these days. Not enough for a full post, yet the flotsam and jetsam of living a life in the Republican dominated United States.

The No Kings rally was fun, yet it is over. It was good to catch up with people I know. By studying the terrain in advance, I think I did a better job capturing photographs. It is important to live engaged lives and mass organizing events like this, combined with a modicum of thoughtful photographic work make it easy.

After much study of my October activity, I determined the thousands of views of this blog originating in China are likely a Bot or Bots scraping me to train artificial intelligence.The views are neither human activity, nor do they necessarily originate in China, whose “Great Firewall” blocks WordPress. Combine that with posting my high school class reunion photos the same month, and I received more October views than I did in the five previous years combined. I don’t feel good about it because the rate is not sustainable. Once the Bots have their way with me, I will be jettisoned like an empty chewing gum wrapper.

I planted garlic last week, so the garden is done except for the gleaning. For some reason, it took a lot more energy this year. I truly needed Sunday as a day of rest as in I took four naps during daylight hours. I feel more rested now, and pulled out the manuscript of my autobiography.

I reread the chapters last written and they stand up okay. I decided to write through my work at the transportation and logistics firm I called home for 25 years to clear space for topics I find more interesting: things like cooking, gardening, political activism, and such. I’ve been toying with ending the second volume after becoming an empty nester, yet reconsidered. I’ll write all the way to the end and see the word count. In any case, due to some unforeseen expenses, I’m not as liquid as I’d like and don’t have the money to publish volume two or any volume. It is possible I will push through the draft of the entire story by end of year. I changed while writing it and that means a rewrite of a couple of big sections. I do want to publish the rest. At the same time, I expect to start drafts of the entire story to which I will add on a continuing basis as I find new material and gain new insights. It will become a never ending story.

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading!

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Living in Society

The Meat of It

Cattle in Cedar County, Iowa.

Beef and meat prices have little immediate impact on our family of vegetarians. About the only time I noticed the price of meat was while buying some for a low-income household. My money would have gone farther if prices were not so high.

“Beef prices have climbed to record highs after cattle ranchers slashed their herds due to a years long drought in the western United States that dried up lands used for grazing and raised feeding costs,” reported Reuters. “By the beginning of the year, the herd had dwindled to 86.7 million cattle, the smallest number for the time period since 1951, according to U.S. government data.”

Sounds like the impact of the climate crisis. Just saying.

The president said he is looking at doing something. “(The price of beef is) higher than we want it, and that’s going to be coming down pretty soon too. We did something,” Trump said in typical obfuscatory language. “We are working on beef, and I think we have a deal on beef.”

When the president says he “did something,” he is fighting a fire he started. That’s one heckuva way to run a government. This is also true with the collapse of the soybean market for American farmers, and so much more.

Here’s the core of it. Many people feel meat is an important part of an American diet. Cattle supply is one thing yet the Trump tariffs are another driving up prices. “The Trump administration’s tariffs are hitting major beef suppliers such as Brazil — and are set to push prices for American consumers even higher,” reported the Washington Post.

It’s no secret livestock farming is a primary cause of the climate crisis. Farmers and scientists are seeking solutions like anaerobic manure digesters in confinement livestock operations. They capture methane released as manure is processed into liquid fertilizer and bedding material for cows. The better solution is to find other sources of nutrition than meat.

I endeavor to set aside the drama of politicians in Washington, D.C. We, as a society should reduce our consumption of meat. There are plenty of other great tasting, nutritious things to eat. Likewise we can and should address the climate crisis… before it’s too late. The meat of it is eat less meat.

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Living in Society

Further Thoughts on AI

Milkweed gone to seed.

On Oct. 1, the machine at ChatGPT told me I had used my allowance of queries for my free account. It was fine. It offered me a lesser quality query until my account reset. I logged out instead and quickly found other things to do.

After re-reading my post about using AI, which includes an essay I asked the machine to write, I decided it was a good call to refrain from using ChatGPT in my autobiography. The main issue is it relies on what is available on the internet on a given topic. Because my autobiography is being written from journals, photographs, memories and other in-real-life documentation, such information is not available for the machine to read. It will produce a present-biased, internet-derived account about whatever I ask about my life. That is not what I want in this project.

While it did a reasonable job drafting something from the contents of this blog, it only knows me that way and that is a deficiency that cannot be easily corrected. For example, I asked the machine to write a brief autobiography of me. It’s response tells the story: “I couldn’t find enough reliable public information to write a full, detailed 1,000-word biography of Paul Deaton of Iowa.” This was despite my essay of that name, which lives on this blog and is my most popular post since I began in 2007. Either the machine is lazy, or it has programming that discourages this type of query. This discovery of the limits of ChatGPT is of value.

What can I use ChatGPT or another AI program to do? I see three applications based on asking these questions of the machine.

Give me ideas in how to use ChatGPT as diarist. I have been journaling since 1974 and the evolution of styles and content is striking. They developed over time. Naturally the machine wants to talk about events in my journal all day so it can learn as much as possible about me. I won’t do that, yet the occasional query can help me find direction in that kind of writing. It also made these suggestions for how to use the machine: “The key is deciding whether you want me to be: An analyst (finding themes and patterns); A recorder (storing entries); An editor (shaping them into narratives); or A mirror (asking questions back).” Even though I am alone when journaling, I don’t need a machine partner with which to interact.

What are some ideas for vegetarian and vegan enchiladas? Using ChatGPT to determine what to cook and eat seems solid. I entered on-hand ingredients and the machine suggested a specific recipe that used them. It provided grouping of ideas by flavor-type, such as hearty and savory, bright and fresh, protein-rich, toppings and finishing touches. So often, my ideas are pulling out a familiar cookbook and paging through it. AI could be an alternate way of figuring out what’s for dinner. There is value in that.

What are some ways to balance household work for today? I also entered tasks for the day. Personal productivity is important and the machine gave me useful ideas on how to structure my day. Because we are creatures of habit, we need to break out of what we do to improve how much we get done in a day. AI did not hesitate to tell me I scheduled too much to do, suggesting tasks that could be done tomorrow. It also changed how certain tasks were scheduled in the day, for example, moving cooking to the afternoon and spreading meal prep throughout the day. Going forward, I expect to use AI to help restructure how I spend my time. It may get to the point where I’m satisfied with how my new daily schedule is going. If so, then I will step away from AI for a while. I do know I was productive but exhausted by mid afternoon the first day I tried using an AI planner. This despite more scheduled rest and recovery time throughout the day.

It seems important we get AI out of our system. Like with everything, moderation of use seems essential.

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Kitchen Garden

Harvesting Fall Greens

Kale washing duty on Sept. 30, 2025.

On the last day of September I walked through the greens plot and picked what looked good. It included this kale plus a generous amount of collards and chard. While it was challenging to push through the tall foxtail weeds, at the end of season I leave them so small birds can light on them and eat the seeds. I washed and stored everything we did not eat for supper in the refrigerator. Wednesday morning for breakfast, I cooked and ate a bag of collards picked on August 30. Cruciferous vegetables store well in the refrigerator, although the oldest should be used first. They truly are a mainstay ingredient in our kitchen garden.

On some days I sit at my desk without an idea of where I will go with the day’s writing. I do sit down, though. Perhaps that is a sign of habit and discipline of the kind required by a writer. I am mostly sure I will ground what I write in some kind of local reality, like the greens harvest I just finished.

As I have written before, this blog is a way to get my writing juices flowing. I keep the posts short so they can be finished early in the day and I can move on to whatever creative endeavor is next. As fall progresses, that is usually a couple of hours writing and editing my autobiography. It also includes other work around the property. Writing is the foundation of my current life.

Writing in public is distinguished from producing a journal, email, or other private writing. This blog serves that purpose and because I get feedback in the form of comments, contact from people I know via telephone, text, or email. Each post is a work in progress after it is posted. While most posts remain unmodified, the conversations I have result in changing wording or changing how I think about a topic. My writing here is the public facing part of my life. It is essential.

Some call my writing political, yet I don’t know about that. When I write about politics, my personal experience and perspective are adjacent to it. It is better to criticize the administration about inflation by talking about how much the cost of a home-brewed cup of coffee increased this year than talk in vague generalities influenced by journalism and social media. In the end, political topics must necessarily be grounded in this place I call home to be meaningful.

I didn’t know I would be harvesting greens on Tuesday. I didn’t know how far I would get in the apple harvest this week. These are pragmatic unknowns with which a writer lives every day. Through practicing the craft of writing, without presumptions of what it should be, we can get better at it. That’s something I hope I am doing.