The Friendly Beasts

We just got back from a wonderful week at our cabin in Ohio. It wasn't as 

"muggy and buggy" as it usually is in July. 

One afternoon, after planting geraniums at the cemetery, we took a side trip on the way home. When we saw some grazing horses, we stopped to take their picture. The "horses" turned out to be friendly and curious donkeys. 

The dirt road got narrower and narrower and steeper and steeper and the ruts got deeper and deeper. Side trips may not be such a great idea if you don't really know the neighborhood. 

Earlier that day, on the way to Mount Vernon to buy the geraniums, I saw a "calico cow". Yes! Its legs and its body just above the legs were black and the rest of it was tan and white. We kept going, thinking we'd take its picture on the way back. By the time we returned, the "cow" (could have been a male calf, I suppose) was nowhere to be seen, of course. 

Phil's sister spent the night, Phil's cousin spent the day on Sunday and a neighbor came for dinner another day. We watched yellow finches at the bird feeder, saw a few deer and spotted "our" blue heron, who hangs out at the creek. Phil scared a baby duck when he crossed the bridge tapping his walking stick. The duckling took off like a rocket, paddling and squawking frantically. Phil then heard a commotion up the creek, as if the members of the duck family were trying to find each other.

I slept out on the screened porch one chilly night. The stars were bright. At dawn, birdsong! Maybe 20 species of birds sang and chirped for an hour or so, and then, as morning came on, the chorus abruptly fell silent. A week at "the farm" shows me how far removed I am from the natural world most of my days.