Notes from Cottonwood

You asked what Cottonwood Estates is. It's about two hundred wood-frame houses built in 1997 for the contractors, with lawns, a little pool, a playground and a gate with a guard (a very polite man called Marat who waves at the kids). All the houses look alike, so Lily came home to the wrong one twice.

The funny part is that the wood-frame houses are the only ones like that in the whole country. Everything else around here is brick or concrete. There's a lumber yard at the edge of the neighborhood that sells boards in feet and inches, and the sign has both. Mark says the owner is a proud man.

Our street at 7 a.m. The mountains are behind the clouds.