Say It Aint So

White flickers in the sky over the highway picked out by the morning sun. Snowy Egrets are flocking, heading into the marsh to feed. A Plover flops around on the sand pretending injury. It draws our eyes from the ping pong ball sized fluff on stilts that are its young as they cruise across the beach to the safety of the dunes. A man and his children walk across the packed dirt soccer field as my train rumbles past. He sends his dog out after a flock of Canada Geese who freak as they scramble into the sky. Several other flocks of geese watch from the river. Great Blue Herons surround a marsh pool deciding which morsels will be their appetizers.

Migration is starting to happen. Hot as it may be and hard as it is to admit there are few weeks of summer left, one of the better times to be on the water is here.

ex-Luther

8AM on a Sunday morning the tide is coming in and the sun is beating down. The river is brown with sediment kicked up by yesterday’s storms up river. Small fish and eels roil in the water as something larger comes calling, never quite breaking the surface itself. I am casting…hoping to catch whatever is cruising unseen. Luther eyes me as he wanders up, hugging the canal walls. He is looking for something easy to eat and watches me and my lure. He hops up on the granite ten feet away, examines my fishing technique for a bit then takes a nap, unimpressed. Cormorants are masters at fishing, I am not.

Luther’s sleep is deep, undisturbed by our setting out boats and prepping for a SUP class. He wakes again when the tide laps against his feet. He eyes us once more before settling back into the water for a final circuit of the landing and a mosey up river. He is an older, experienced bird sharing one last morning with us.