It's Saturday. I've just been in the garden with my 4-month-old son. It's basically been winter since he was born, and his sight's only really just come in, so it was his first real look at the world.
Mostly he was interested in the shapes the sky made in the leaves of the beech tree, and the gentle clatter of the breeze in the cabbage tree.
''Spring's coming, love,'' I said.
But he didn't answer, just sucked his hand and looked in the direction of a kereru feeding in a kowhai tree.
Meanwhile, in Bedminster, New Jersey what's going on in US President Donald Trump's brain? That new set of grips he's arranged for his golf clubs? The meeting he keeps postponing with Scary ol' General Flynn? Or maybe mad-Don's talking to ''his'' other generals about the prevailing wind on the Korean Peninsula and where all that darn radiation might end up. Or is that too cynical? Probably he's with his son - out on Pop's personal deck - looking across to a grove of red oaks and wondering out loud when the leaves will change.
And Jacinda? Facebook tells me she's in Auckland, at a pay equity rally. Must be she's too busy for my email. I sent her one this morning - before the kids woke up - but I haven't heard back. Not that John Key answered the email I sent asking him to take more Syrian refugees.
That was around the time the child was photographed washed up on the beach. My first son had just been born, and it was hard not to imagine him lying on that sand, his dead feet being gently washed by the Mediterranean.
Now, when I think about the Syrian refugee crisis, it's almost with fondness. Millions displaced, hundreds of thousands dead, ancient cities decimated. I mean, these days we've got Trump, and forget artillery or sarin gas, he's going nuclear!
Goodbye Seoul, Pyongyang, Tokyo, Guam.
If bombs go off, it won't be as bad here in Kaikorai Valley. But nuclear winds, nuclear winters. Why is my family's future in the soft little hands of this maniac? Reading about Trump's ''Fire and Fury'' I wondered, what can I do? At least with that other great 21st century menace you can walk to work, or take fewer flights, or, become adept at recycling.
And though those things probably won't stop the Taieri Plain becoming known for its banana and pineapple plantations, at least you are doing. And ''doing'' helps alleviate anxiety, helps press the fear further back in the brain.
I thought about tweeting somebody. Or sending some NZD to the Democrats. Or booking a flight to Wellington and marching on the US embassy, but won't that ambassador dude be out mountain-biking? Maybe a Kiwi politician could help?
They're our representatives - surely they have mine and my child's interests at heart? But doesn't there always need to be something in it for them?
Hi Jacinda,
Congratulations on being elected leader. My wife and I are hoping you'll become our next Prime Minister.
Taking out the recycling, I've just had an idea on how to increase your chances of that becoming a reality.
Announce that, under no circumstances, will you have anything to do with Donald J Trump. He's a misogynist, a racist, a war-monger, a bully, and a cretin.
Say you'll deal with the Senate and with Congress, and that your statement targets not the US, but Donald Trump. It would be akin to the no nuclear stance that helped give David Lange such a profile. You'd be the first politician to be totally explicit about your distaste for Trump, and the first politician to refuse any dealings with him. You'd be on the front page of The New York Times and The Guardian and any number of other international papers/websites.
New Zealanders' love New Zealanders who make a splash worldwide. It would be a very reasonable and justifiable argument. It would take people's breath away. And that, I think, is what you are going to need to win this election. Something big.
Good luck!
Breton Dukes.
-Breton Dukes is a Dunedin writer and stay-at-home dad.
