Everybody has a different opinion about what is beautiful and what is not. Here are some of my favorite things.

1. The way my back yard smells after a summer rain.

2. The way a new father holds his child. There’s just something about that look in his eyes. It’s as if he’s holding a miracle that might break at any minute. And he’s right. It is a miracle.

3. A child playing with a new puppy and watching their interactions for the first time.

4. A teenager playing with that same dog after several years and realizing that the love has grown.

A new lawsuit filed against the federal Environmental Protection Agency accuses the agency of penalizing refiners for failing to meet “unattainable and absurd” cellulosic biofuels quotas outlined in EPA’s renewable fuels standard.

The EPA mandates the purchase of biofuels formulated in part from materials including switchgrass, wood chips and agricultural waste. But the American Petroleum Institute argues that the quotas set an unrealistic goal because no such cellulosic biofuels are produced on a commercial scale in the nation.

As a pediatric orthopedic surgeon and a father of three, I have ample opportunity to practice what I preach. For instance, I reassured my wife that our daughters would outgrow their pigeon toes. When my son split his forehead open, I talked her into letting me treat the wound at home with steri-strips. (I’m still paying for that one, by the way.)

But when my daughter started school, I was the one who needed reassurance when I picked up her backpack. It weighed at least 10 pounds. I couldn’t believe it!

On Tuesday, it will be time for the polls to open again. This column is to beg you all to go and vote for the candidates of your choice.

It always saddens me to hear that only 50 percent or fewer of the American population go to the polls. This is a right we all have to speak our minds. If you don’t like the way our government is being run, then let them know. If you’re satisfied with how things are going, you need to let them know that, too.