For a few years now I’ve lived next to a train station that’s a stop between San Francisco and L.A. I have a sleepy connection with the idling diesels up the hill on the tracks – at night they rattle my window and bring me peace.

When the train leaves it’s like a song cut short waking me up, but the distant sound of the diesel rolling out of town with its whistle blowing into the surrounding hills puts me right back at rest.

The word that comes to mind is connection – knowing those rails lead from here to San Francisco, to the Rockies and through the prairie into the town I grew up in, all the way out to the Atlantic coast and bustling New York. It brings me a smile, like sketching a mockingbird while hearing one sing.