Nature has a way of showing up and showing out.
For weeks, I’ve been watching and waiting for the figs to ripen, and almost overnight the first wave is ready for the picking. I saw the purple-brown fruits last evening and ran inside to fetch a plastic bowl and summoned my husband to bring his long arms and reach the branches down for me so that I could pick them. Together, we got what we could reach. It was too late to fire up the tractor, though. Usually, he raises me up in the bucket so that I can pick from the tip-top of the tree. That’ll happen after work today.
For now, we have our first bowl full, and they are plump and heavy.
But that’s not all that happened yesterday.
I finally caught a glimpse a bird I’ve been hoping to see for the past few years. Up until yesterday, I had only heard them. They live here on this farm, and I hear them in the wee hours of the morning, when it’s still dark. Ironically, I’d conceded our long game of hide and seek in yesterday morning’s post and declared them the winners. It’s as if one of these birds actually read my blog and decided to show a little mercy.
I was in the reading room that overlooks the butterfly garden. From the window that faces southward, I saw a stirring in the trees. A large stirring – – really an extra-large stirring.
Surely not, I thought.
It wasn’t dark. Just a couple of minutes before 8 p.m. on the nose.
It couldn’t be, I told myself.
I ran for my binoculars and searched the dense tree line for the bird, hoping it was still there when I returned.
I turned the knobs to focus and zoomed in as close as I could get.
Sure enough, just as I’d thought.
There it was, sitting on a pine branch, facing the house.
I could barely contain my excitement, yelling for my husband to come quickly, but not yelling loudly enough to scare off my buddy. I handed off my binoculars to him, and counted back the trees, pointed to the limb and actually used fractions to direct him 2/3 of the way up the Loblolly Pine to the Great Horned Owl grasping the branch with both feet.
We stood in awe, watching this great nocturnal bird of prey turn his head all around, watching the ground below for movement, like the embodiment of a Mary Oliver poem with wings.
It was fantastic to see. I still have shivers just thinking about the magnificent stature of this amazing creature and its commanding but camouflaged and silent presence.
After a few moments, he dove to the ground in pursuit of something he’d spotted, and just like that he vanished into the woods to feast on his catch.
And I’m burning with owl fever now, wishing desperately that he had a little camera attached to him like a policeman wears a bodycam, so I could have his night vision and see where all he goes and what he does. I’d have to hide my eyes when it came time for him to kill the bunnies and field mice and other critters, but I’d lose sleep for weeks just watching how he lives his days and nights.
Today was a treasure – ripe figs and Great Horned Owls. Life doesn’t get much more exciting.
Common Threads 