Our house sets in one corner of a 3 acre lot covered by a lot of scraggly pine trees and rocks. But we really like it. Today I broke my “stay on the concrete” rule and took a walk.

I walked farther than the sat view suggests, but you get a sense of the terrain. I could still hear cars off to the south and a train whistle down by the river to the north. But those were distant sounds and it was mostly quiet. I was so still for a bit that a squirrel did cartoon double-take (“WTF! You’re not supposed to be here!)

I took a few pix but they didn’t capture the feeling. I know that hunters get this natural high when they go out to shoot something but it’s a new experience for me. I’ll do this again until it gets too cold, and it might be nice in the spring.

My take-away was how fortunate we are to “have” even a little piece of the planet we can pretend is our own. No ATV assholes or snow mobiles. Just some trees and squirrels and me.