Find the time for the simple moments FROM

LAURA MCFARLAND Managing Editor

It’s a good thing I like wind chimes.

As this column is being written, I am sitting on my deck on a gorgeous sunny day enjoying the first real outside workday of 2023, meaning the time spent writing and returning emails but not tied to my desk.

The only potential negative to the beautiful 74-degree day is the strong wind, but other than the constant but harmonious wind chime concert emanating from behind me, I avoided any actual downsides by not bringing paperwork outside and tightening the screw on the stand holding the umbrella shading me from the sun.

It is a peaceful day, if not necessarily a quiet one. The frogs croaking in the nearby woods, the neighbor’s laying hens clucking in their pen, the cawing birds circling something in a nearby field, and the bugs occasionally buzzing my head in apparent dive bomb patterns all provide their own symphony of sound. The barking of dogs in the distance and low hum of the particularly loud traffic on the nearby major road aren’t too distracting. All that is missing is a neighbor partaking of some firearm target practice to make the