When I See The Eagles Fly.

When I See The Eagles Fly.

I look out from my back deck.  For nearly three years I have the good fortune of a view of a small pond behind my house.  The house sits on a ridge that surrounds this pond, maybe fifty feet below.  Fairly steep climb.  Close to the pond, surrounding it, are holly bushes, which remain green all year.  Thorny, stickerly, tear your jacket and green.  A stay away from me, green.

Long ago somebody whacked a path through the holly down to the ponds edge.  My little family and I climb it enough to keep it clear from growing back.  It is a very pretty walk, or climb I should say.  Slippery on the way down, thigh burning on the way back up.

In the summer my daughter and I frequently kayak around on this little puddle of tranquility.  I keep a two person kayak in a mossy cove with a nice gentle slope to get in and out of the boat … generally without getting your feet wet.  So peaceful.  Because of the high ridge around it, the water in the pond is most often flat.   It’s protected and not actually big enough for waves of any size to build up.  Tiny ripples sometimes when the wind is from the north, but that’s about it.

At the time of this writing, the month of March, above the stripe of holly green around the shoreline, is a very tall curtain of gray winter leafless trees.  From my view on the back deck, this curtain of gray is so high that it crowds much view of the sky.  So much so that sometimes it is difficult to tell what the weather would be like if we left our little gentile spot of woods.

I can see about a third of the full pond … no that’s not right, maybe a couple hundred yards.  The pond is actually an “L” shape and we are right at the corner on the outside of the “L”.  So I can see about a quarter of the upright of the L and none of the bottom.  A thin band of deep green and a big band of wiggly tree branches of monochromatic light gray.

Very soon, another week, maybe two of this warm weather we can get here in March, a fog of light green will creep into the wall of gray around the pond.  That fog will develop into a fuller green, lighter in hue than the holly, pushing back against the death of winter gray.

Crows … I love crows.  Crows are quite brilliant (for birds) and crows are tough.  Here in the central east in the Chesapeake Bay Region, crows stay all winter.  They pick clean whatever corn grain is left on the farmlands and, I am certain, pick off any smaller woodsy rodents that dare to come above ground.

Vultures … for me it’s hard to love vultures.  Nature has not given the vulture much in the manner of beauty.  I mean, let’s be honest.  But I find I have to respect vultures.  I don’t know all that much about vultures, or crows for that matter, but vultures are a very reliable barometer of the health of a rural area.

A lot of vultures mean there are a lot of other wildlife critters in that area.  It’s just logical.  Crows will eat grain, or just about anything.  Vultures eat dead meat.  That’s it.  No dead animals, no vultures.

In this region, vultures show up when hibernating critters start milling around trying to grab breakfast.  And when skunks, raccoons, deer start having to increase their territories because they’ve eaten everything else they could find close to home.

They start having to cross roads.  WHAM!  Dead critter in the road!  Next … vultures.

That’s late winter, or early spring.

Imagine being able to take to the air and travel great distances.  Thousands of miles, to wherever suited your needs or fancies.  Really a magical skill.

Soon I won’t be able to see our little pond at all.  An almost solid wall of green will separate my view from my deck to the water.  Just a thick palette knife stroke of speckled green.  A swash of mottled texture of nature at its finest.

But this morning as I meditate on our pond, I saw the eagles.  For three Springs now a pair of eagles has come just about this same time of year.  Because the trees are still bare and the weather is warming, the eagles soar in from their winter’s roost, wherever that was, and build their summer cottage.  Usually in the same huge oak about two inlets over from my kayak cove.

I can see them glide, swoop, pivot like sky dancers against the curtain of gray bare trees.

Truly beautiful, massive birds, unmistakable Lord and Lady of the sky over this patch of water and woods.  I know warm and wonderful summer is not far away when I see the eagles fly.