6:00 a.m.

As I arrived home from my morning walk, the tree-removal-service trucks I'd passed at the Village Restaurant pulled into the neighbor's driveway. Well, one did. The others staked themselves out in the street itself. I told my wife that they were going to be chopping trees in a few minutes and we swannied for a bit about babies and loud noises and unnecessarily killing trees. When I took out the trash, I walked across the street and asked the man with the I ♥ Jesus license plate on his big ol' Chevy truck if there was any way they could begin the job later, since I had babies asleep. He said No. And I said OK. And he thought Whatever. And I was like Whatever. At 6:05 they fired up the chain-saws. No children woke up. And if Jack Henry had, he probably would have been spellbound by the big trucks - his favorite thing in the world - outside his bedroom window. All in all, it was a non-issue, like so many issues that we concern ourselves with.

And they haven't cut down the persimmon tree. Yet.