indeed there is a blue true dream of sky today, along with the birthday of life and of love and wings, especially wings (bless you, e.e. cummings).
three majestic osprey swoop and hover, then drop straight from the sky to splash in the river beneath, again and again. what speed, what a wingspan, what a thrill each time. and i'm told this is but a harbinger of things to come, when the alewives and then the salmon start their runs, there will be many more. osprey and marty are kindred spirits so whenever i see them, i feel doubly blessed.
earlier a baltimore oriel with a freshly painted orange breast lit on the not-yet-blooming lupin just outside my window, singing a song with sweet, high, delicious notes. i haven't been so close to an oriel since childhood. i felt a surge of familiarity when i first saw it but had to look it up to i.d. it. once i did so, memories of its distant relatives in western michigan came back, mostly from a wooded lot near our house where we built a fort and did daylight camping.
my best friend linda foxworthy, our younger sibs terry and donny, and a few other carefully chosen friends hung out there a lot one summer. i remember cutting branches and making a sort of large nest on the ground, but i'm not sure if we made a tent with a blanket or what provisions we brought with us. i remember best the quiet, the cool shade, the bliss of slipping away from ordinary life and feeling like the lucky, lucky boxcar children in our own simple, secret world. when i remember summers like that i wish i could call my parents and say thank you.
