Sky and Earth and Water, All Together

The beaver pond is still, reeds and cedars along the far shore cloaked in drifting fog that billows and swirls as though stirred by a vast, benign and blessing hand. Ducks are swimming about among the reeds, and they can be heard quaking now and then, but they cannot be seen.  Mallards perhaps?

Earth and water are warmer than the air this morning, and the meeting of the three elements spins a pearly veil over everything in sight. Either sunlight or autumn rain would disperse the fog, but there is rain in the cards for today, and it will most likely be rain that lifts the gossamer veil.

The eastern Ontario highlands are taking deep breaths and shifting into their early winter configuration, trees bare and whiskery on their slopes, fallen leaves ankle deep in the woods and windblown fields arrayed in grey and taupe. On the other side of the pond, the hawthorns and mountain ashes have lost their leaves entirely and wear only a few withered and frost touched berries.

Just out of sight, the scribe is wearing wellies (the left boot has a hole in it) and oilskins, and she is carrying a camera, lenses, pen and field notebook. Caught up in the fey ambiance, she thinks the day would be even more magical with a single beam of sunlight coming through the trees beyond the pond and shining through the fog to generate voluminous shadows in three dimensions. She was feeling rather lost when she got here, and in truth, she is still feeling a little lost, but paradoxically, she is also feeling at home.