Dear Marion,

Thank your for your letter. The hummingbirds haven't visited
the feeders for two days, and I suppose they're on their way
south.  I managed to avoid the shopping trip into the nearby
city, Bristol VA, by repairing my chainsaw. Apparently the
ethyl alcohol with which the gasoline is diluted is hydrophilic,
and the moisture it attracts interferes with the ignition in
the two-cycle engine. I had ignored the instructions to replace
the gasoline after 30 days. When I did so, the engine started.
For the radio which I thought I should buy, I searched the
Internet and found at Cambridge SoundWorks, whose founder was
one of my patients, a very good unit that had been discontinued
and was being offered at a 70 percent discount, - just what I
was looking for. It will probably arrive in the mail in about
a week. The clothesline I repaired with a simple extension to
an adjacent maple tree.

Most of the day I spent writing and reading what I have written.
Chapter 42 has already swelled to thirteen pages, perhaps half
of its ultimate length, but will require extensive emendation,
because I have given my protagonist free rein to elaborate his
theories of epistemology and ethics, for which I will need to
invent suitable camouflage to make it acceptable to readers of
a novel. I find it most productive to write what is on my mind,
and to postpone the censoring of my text until the plot has
defined itself.

My mood is autumnal. I miss Margrit very much, and to a lesser 
degree my parents. Every aspect of this house reminds me of them.
I feel a need to put my world in order, not least my memories
and my thoughts, which often find their way to you, in the hope
that you are happy and well.

Jochen