Time Spent With Rabbits Is Time Well Spent

We've had several of the first few gorgeous, chilly early-fall mornings. I am a person who loves the fall perhaps best of all. If you live in Pennsylvania, the autumn color change is one of the most spectacular shows around. The change is coming, the change is coming! I have to try hard to stop myself from dancing!

My only regret for this day was that I would spend much of it inside. I had to work, while my husband went out Monday and Tuesday on one of the first backpacking trips of fall, without me.

He returned on Tuesday just before I arrived home from work, and as we caught up on his adventures, he asked me about the moon. Had I seen it the evening before? It was so bright, he insisted, that darkness never really fell. No, I admitted, I had not.

On the evening before, while he was away, I had spent some time catching up on household tasks rather than watching for the moon. Such silly pragmatism is unlike me, but what can I say. Sometimes the floor needs a good vacuuming, even if the moon is outside waiting to whisper silvery-sweet nothings in a girl's ear.

So on this evening, we resolved to see the moon rise. And so at the appropriate time, I went out into the yard to watch for it. It turns out I was a bit early for the moon, so I took the opportunity to go around filling up the water bowls we keep in the yard for our wild creatures. And as I did so, I rounded the corner of the hedge and nearly stumbled over a small rabbit!

It was too small to be Cinnabun or Hunnybun. Too big to be one of the two new micro-buns I've shown you in two recent blips (here and here). So therefore, via the process of elimination, I presumed it to be Mini-Bun, who was up until recently the smallest rabbit in the yard.

I stopped and got down on my knees with my camera and spoke to the rabbit in a gentle tone of voice. And amazingly enough, the rabbit was unafraid, and came much closer to me than it ever has before. At one point, I thought I might be able to reach out and touch it, but I try not to press my luck, even with rabbits, because they are wild creatures after all. I did not need to use zoom, as close as I was. And in fact, at one moment, I thought the rabbit might walk right between my feet!

The little rabbit was no more than about eight inches (20 cm) long, from ear-tip to tippy-toe. Its little body was muscled and perfect. Not a single hare (sorry, hair) out of place. It nibbled on the grass, and at new noises, it turned its ears in the direction of the sound like tiny TV antennas. Tuning in for remote broadcasts, no doubt; even ones that I couldn't hear. Maybe even listening to the sound of angel song as the evening fell around us. For don't the angels always sing at sunrise and sunset?

Oh, and the moon? Well, the moon did rise eventually, and I took some pictures of it, but the moments I spent with the moon did not touch my heart like the time that I shared with this rabbit, communing, enjoying a few peaceful moments in each other's quiet presence.

Finally, a noise spooked it, and the rabbit hopped away under the hedge. But I felt better for the time we shared, happier, more whole, more philosophical about things. I would say this, my friends: time spent with rabbits is time well spent.

The song to accompany the photo of this charming rabbit is Bobby Darin performing If I Could Talk To the Animals.