There's a preschool next to where I work, and as I was walking out to the parking lot one day last week, I could hear the squeak of a swingset and the happy yelling laughter of children. It immediately took me back to my days of elementary school. It also made me think about how saturated the world is in sound and how I don't even notice most of the time.

So as I'm trying to tune out politics right now, I'm also making an effort to notice noise. Some sounds I'm finding particularly satisfying:

• the crunch of leaves, especially in the woods where there's a thick layer
• rain pattering on our metal roof
• D-Fiddy's shutter opening and closing
• a deck of cards being fanned and shuffled
• the crackling of a fire
• the solid click of a metal deadbolt
• the crunching-paper sound my computer makes when I empty the trash
• purring