I was getting a few miles in recently on some strolls where I am this week in the late morning hours when the sky appeared endlessly blue and the smells of honeysuckle wafted through the branch nearby and over the field.

The oak by the bridge had an opening that the animals were putting to use.

A sycamore farther down the slope caught my eye. Sycamores remind me of boyhood when I climbed them and heard the sound of their bark crunch crisply under my tennis shoes and how instantly their leaves took flame and disappeared in orange tongues in autumn.

And the feathered beauties captured in photographs by my friend Jim captivated still.