Fragments From Floyd

It was odd but comforting to have someone but me here during the day. Even odder, Ann was upstairs humming to herself as the much-neglected Singer whirred intermittently as she repaired my favorite jacket for my trip next week.

"Ah! Fred! Look out the front window" she called down from her perch.

Through the knee-high pasture grass, fifteen turkeys (or rather turkey heads) undulated through the field in their odd stop-start head-bobbing fashion. They moved methodically, kicking in the soft soil for the last of the insects not hibernating for winter, fifteen reptilian birds moving east in a cooperative phalanx flushing out a meal. I ran up the steps to get Ann's better view, grabbing my binocs on the way up.

There is nothing about a turkey I haven't seen. I can't say what was so exciting about this sighting. Maybe because it was unexpected and that we had been suddenly privy to the orderliness and intracacy of a nature that goes on without us. There is beauty and blessing in that providence.

While I watched the turkeys disappear into the pines along Nameless Creek, a blur flashed by out of the corner of my eye-- a squirrel leaping through the tall grass. It sure looked like it might be a fox squirrel. I've tried since late August to get a good view of one. Yep. Tail as long as the gray body, russet belly, white blaze on the large head. I watched him until I couldn't hold the binoculars to my eyes any longer.

Life is good.