Footprints In The Orphaned Woods

Last nights snow was heavy and wet.  It stuck to my shovel and was already melting down the icicles  on the edge of the roof.

Later, in my studio, I listened as a tidal wave of snow slid from the slates arching over the bird feeder and piling up in a long line on the ground.

I didn’t really have time for a walk with Bellydancing class a couple of hours away.  But tomorrow the snow might all be gone and the woods will be another place than it is today.

What I saw, that wasn’t there after the snow first fell, were lots of footprints.  Mostly squirrel and rabbits, but also the flutter of a birds wings….

…and the Bobcat.

It’s the first I’ve seen of the bobcat since the summer when Fate found her scat on the rocks.  Today, Zinnia and Fate walked the low rock wall covered in snow and footprints and most importantly to them, her scent.

I followed along, ducking under low branches till I lost the trial.  I have no hopes of finding her.  I don’t believe she’d let that happen, but I like to pretend.   I imagine us looking each other, both of us startled, but neither of us moving long enough for me to get a good look.  To get my fill of her wildness.

But in reality it would be me and two dogs confronting her.   And I know that Fate and Zinnia want nothing to do with a bobcat.  Just as they don’t want to catch the chipmunks and deer they always quickly give up chasing.

I look up from my laptop as I write this and see beads of rain running down the living room window. It will either freeze tonight or keep melting.

Tomorrows woods will tell another story.