A bit after dusk, the hens file slowly and in their direct, business-like, pecking way into the barn. They wander to and fro, checking for the last bugs, seeds or meal of the day. Then, within a minute or two of each other, they come over to the roost, hop up and cluck softly, spreading out and finding their own spots, preening, cleaning, their sounds becoming softer, soothing, restful. In the evening now, Maria and I go into the barn and watch this process, which takes about 10 minutes. The new hens are already used to my camera – I show up scattering worms and meal so they get easy with me – and we love to hear these soft and calming sounds of transition, of rest. All of this dancing is done in unison, by instinct, in accordance with some secret signal we do not know. We lock up the roost and the barn and leave and find that this is a restful transition for us, also, from the work day to the quieter and calmer evening.

I’ve  put up a photo album of the roosting feeling on Facebook.

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Culture. I am excited to have just bought two tickets to the new Broadway Production of “Death Of A Salesman” starring Philip Seymour Hoffman. We’re going in May, and the set is the same one used when the play opened in 1947. I think this play contains some of the most powerful writing I have ever heard or seen and I cannot imagine a more prescient work. Miller foresaw the corporate destruction of the dignity and security once associated with good work. Willy Loman was a prophet sounding a warning nobody heard.