The New York Times - I wrote this email from my backyard

I wrote this email from my backyard.

I’m sure my colleagues here at Wirecutter will be unsurprised to hear this. I’ve developed something of a reputation as a sun chaser.

I spend these sunny workdays showing up to Zoom meetings under a Sunbrella patio umbrella at a farmhouse table on my back patio, happily clacking away at my laptop while streaming Pandora from my iPhone to Wirecutter’s favorite portable speaker.

I swear, I’m working. Hard. But being outside in my backyard, golden sunlight dripping from the sky onto my skin, where it then seeps into my very soul, it often doesn’t feel like work.

As evening approaches, I set up Wirecutter’s favorite way to keep mosquitos at bay, and start cooking dinner on our favorite gas grill, co-opting what had very recently been my workspace into the Frumin family’s outdoor dining table.

Afterwards, we’ll kick around a soccer ball on the lawn, or set up a makeshift baseball diamond and play a bit of casual T-ball. My kids cheer on my athletic wife with the heroic moniker of “our star player” as she effortlessly slugs the ball over our backyard fence. (When I come to bat, my 5-year-old son heckles me with the pejorative “Loser Ben.” Nice.)

On evenings where we’re feeling extra ambitious, we’ll set up one of the two inflatable bounce houses we’ve been gifted by overzealous family members. Yes, we own two. And they are fantastic.