On a gorgeous spring morning, everything is on the move

On Friday, on my way to work, there were turkeys in the road. My first turkeys of the season, though I had been hearing reports all around me of flocks here and flocks there. It is almost no longer unusual to encounter wild turkeys in the city, though I think it will always be thrilling to me.

On Sunday morning, early, Doug and the dogs and I walked down to the lake. It was just a little after 7, but the world was a cacaphony of sound. This was one of those weird June days that are occasionally dropped into April, and it was warm and windy and starting to get humid.

Down at the lake, the red-wing blackbirds were trilling. The gulls screeched overhead, riding crazily on billows of air. A duck--female, of course--quacked, loudly and over and over and over and over. You could see her bill widening as she called, and eventually, reclucantly, her green-winged mallard mate slunk over to her side and they glided off, she triumphant, he p-whipped, perhaps.

In the bushes along the lake shore, sparrows called their spring Pheebe Pheebe! And the cardinals called cheer! cheer! cheer!

As the dogs sniffed at the dirt and dead grass looking for something interesting perhaps to eat, or, at least roll in, I heard a throaty warble coming from the water, and my head shot up. "A loon!" Sure enough, we could see that straight neck and needle-like bill far out in the middle of Como Lake. Two of them. Three, four.

It's been three years since loons visited us--they come by in the spring during migration, stopping here for a day or a week when the lakes up north are still frozen. (And how do they know? What a mystery.)

We watched as a muskrat cut through the water and climbed up on one of the last remaining patches of ice, joining two of his buddies. They hunched on the slush and gobbled up--something. But what? Bits of vegetation that had been frozen in the ice and was now melting free? Another mystery.

Oh what a glorious morning. By noon it was in the 70s, with a threatening sky and strong winds. I changed into shorts and a tshirt for the first time since October, and climbed on my bike, pedaled off, and got lost. Over in Reservoir Woods, up and down the hills, through the pines, past the marshy swamps, the spring peepers were so loud that I thought, at first, that my ears were ringing. 

Oh what a beautiful day. I emerged from the woods, toiled up Larpenteur Avenue back toward Como Lake and glided on home. By now the strong wind had shifted and the temperature was beginning to drop. By late afternoon we were back to sweatshirts and I ran around the house closing the windows.

But for one spectacular morning, it was summer, and we took full advantage of it...even knowing that in spring you don't have to be frantic; in the spring, there is more to come.

Boscoe update: He had a glucose test on Friday, and his numbers were very high. Way out of whack--perhaps because of all the non-doctor-approved foods I have had to give him, trying to tempt his appetite. So we raised his insulin from 9 units to 11, and in only two days he already looks better. Drinking less. Much less spacey. Still wobbly, still hard to feed, but oh so much better. I can tell, it's going to be a great summer.