if you happen to be a dog. Not.
Or the owner of a dog. Nope.
Or people temporarily in possession of granddogs. Yes. Their actual, official humans are in Italy for the week, so Gus and Ottie are making do with us.
Magic hour. Rowley’s Bridge.
Nice trail if you happen to like white mulberries.
Swamp white oaks.
A sugar maple mysteriously tagged long ago.
We buried a dog here once. Grave undisturbed, good to see.
A stand of mature osage orange trees, probably celebrating their millionth birthday. No production yet this year, of course.
Maclura pomifera is not actually an orange at all, though its oversize pimply fruits do resemble citrus. It is linked more closely to the mulberry. Native Americans preferred its wood for war clubs and bows, so much so that they would travel many miles to harvest the trees.
A nice place to pick raspberries, now still holding tightly to their promise.
The Hudson, majestic. A word coined specifically to describe the Hudson.
Tracks looking very Stand By Me.
I’m pretty sure we once parked here to speak of things that matter.
A nice place for a Golden mud bath in a filthy stream.
Just a start if you are a German short hair. Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity, according to Seneca. Apt words for dog ball chasing.
Back at home for more wind sprints under the sycamore maple. Optimism is a perfectly legitimate response to failure. Another quote applicable to ball chasing from another sage, Mr. Stephen King.
Why not stop and smell the tiger lily blooming out of a patch of fennel?
It’s a granddog’s life. Food, water, a ball chase at magic hour. Soak up all the mud while you can.
Jean Zimmerman 