3.23.16 We set off down the path

     Today was overcast and warm with a faint sweet-scented breeze, so off we bounded, out the back door, struggling through the thorny overgrown path, down through the beautiful sanctuary of a thicket in the Maple/Beech/Birch woods, down the steep incline, to the ridge overlooking the river's secluded outwaters, far below. 
     So many trees have fallen in heavy winds and storms, and I'm relieved that even if the neighbor down the road hadn't slowed down in the last year, on racing about the conservation lands in snowmobiles and ATV's , hunting coyote all year long and having late night shooting parties, the parts now are so obstructed by the fallen trees it would be days of work to go barreling about again. 

     The pup and I paused at the ridge, several hundred feet above the waters, and I saw the bright green of the fields, and the clear clean spring waters, with waterfowl and all sorts of wild ones.
     But now he is three , so with caution thrown to the wind, off he barreled down the steep inclines, to swim and sit in the waters below.
     So I smiled and looked overhead at the sun finally emerging from the overcast day, at the hardy ferns awakening from the winter, as all the wild homes of animals. Thinking I could be happy staying here for a long long time.
     When he finally climbed back up the ridge, we set off down the path to where it intersects with the base of the steep conservation fiends that border our land, and I caught sight of wild scat and digging and bear clawing, so many homes for birds created by the continual hammering out of woodpeckers . And then , such silence, save the pale paper thin Beech leaves, singing in the wind.
     By now, the coyote have all left to travel deeper away from humans toward their summer digs, as food is now plentiful .
     I stood a bit longer, watching duck and geese far below, rippling the waters with their movements and feeding.
     Til it was time and I was ready, and we scrambled back up the hill, back through the protected thicket, back home, and left the outdoors to the wild ones .