Five scribblings of a day (newspaper, Salinger, artificial intelligence, salamanders, warm welcomes).

Coffee, a newspaper, and some time to absorb, summarize, and synthesize. Sometimes that’s a tiny dream, and sometimes parts of your tiny dreams come true, just not all simultaneously.

Sometimes your dreams and joys come in other ways, like good conversation with your teenage daughter driving, and hearing her thoughts as she works her way through Catcher in the Rye for the first time. Plus, it’s raining.

These are multipurpose questions to either think about solo, or talk about with other people. So I do. Including my two-year old.

A boy waits on the porch, hands filled with squiggling, squirming, adorable Northwest salamanders to show off from an afternoon getting dirty in the wild, and my heat is filled with joy at his love for nature.

Sometimes a warm greeting means everything. Everything.