In the Good Old

Summertime peaks about now, with warm, humid days and sultry, torpid nights. The hay in the horse barn fills the air with the faint scent of cinnamon and tiny, new toads dot dot dot through wet morning grass on their way to bugs unlimited.

Here in the Northeast, hints of autumn abound. Robins are getting pretty scarce, although you hear one every now and then. Ours raised three broods on the porch and in the nearby cedars this year, but they are waning now, like the strawberries of June.

Just the other day a scattering of killdeers formed up into a fresh flock and vanished to the south, screaming all the way.

Geese will soon straggle down to the river and cruise the corn fields for spilled kernels. The days grow shorter at an appalling pace, with each morning darker than the one before. The sun, which has been rising well to the north of the big spruce in the neighbors’ yard, is inching its way back south again. By the time it reaches the winter nadir it will rise, already tangled in the branches of the hillside trees, cold, and grim and plumb unwelcoming.

And so we cling to what is left of the season and hope for more of the good days. I will have a few more updates from the fair a little later today. Take care.