Cathedrals of the Sun

Warning: this post begins and ends strangely. (Now you can't say that you haven't been warned!)

It was a day that started out very strangely. At 4 a.m., my husband and I (and very likely Dexter too) were awakened by the sound of a fox barking right outside our bedroom window. It barked a while, then a break, then more barking, a break, then more barking.

We lay there paralyzed with indecision. "Should I go do something?" my husband whispered. "Maybe?" I whispered back. "I bet the fox got into it with the skunk," my husband whispered. But then the barking stopped and the fox went away. After a while, we went back to sleep.

When morning came, we awoke, somewhat bleary-eyed, to find the weather drizzly, with a pungent skunk smell on the air. Upon first light, my husband went out and surveyed the yard, and found the body of a huge skunk not far from where the barking had occurred.

Apparently, a terrible battle had been waged outside our bedroom window, and everybody lost. The fox got skunked, big-time. (Did you know that being sprayed in the eyes by a skunk may also result in temporary blindness?) And the skunk paid with its life: not a mark on its body, its neck was neatly broken.

I felt badly about the skunk, as I do about the death of any of the creatures of our yard. They are dear to me, and I hate to lose them. But we did nothing to cause this tragedy, and there was little we could have done to prevent it. In fact, going out at 4 a.m. and getting into the middle of it with them may have been the stupidest thing of all for us to do.

"In my mind, the fox came for Mini Bunzini," I said to my husband, "and the skunk saved Mini Bunzini's life. The skunk sacrificed its own life so that Mini Bunzini could live," I told him, growing teary-eyed at the thought of the skunk's heroism and self-sacrifice. "There's no way you can prove that," my husband said.

So - hero or no - we decided to bury the skunk. Before I could even get my boots on to help, my husband had gotten a shovel and buried the poor creature in our woods. "This is a very weird day," he said, and placed the stinky shovel in the woods to air out. He also commented: "If anything ever happens to me and you need to put out an ad for a new husband, be sure to include 'must be willing to bury dead skunks before breakfast.' "

Monday had originally been planned as a vacation day for me. But we cancelled our plans when the rain moved in. We decided I would work at home instead. But by mid-morning, the sky was starting to clear. The weather forecast revealed sunny skies for the afternoon, but with showers moving in by 3 or 4 pm or so. "Want to make a compromise and take just the afternoon off?" my husband asked me. "We could go down to the Little Juniata and check out the colors . . . "

Well, he didn't have to say anything more! The Little Juniata River, on a sunny, early October day? I thought back fondly to an adventure we had there last October, a truly delightful day that featured railroad tracks, bridges, and foliage. Of course, I'd go. It sounded like a great adventure! So I said Yes. What fall activity is more fun than chasing the colors?

But the window for our adventure was slim, just a few hours. We'd have to be expeditious. So we grabbed a quick lunch at the Burger King in Tyrone, and made our way toward Huntingdon, stopping at one of the parking areas along the Little Juniata River. We packed up our chairs and our daysacks and a mini cooler and headed down along the water, ending up sitting in our chairs on the bank, below a railroad bridge we like.

The foliage colors were just starting. They are a bit behind where they were this time last year, probably because of the cool, rainy summer. But there were still some lovely yellows along the water, and the fallen leaves crunched and crackled beneath our feet; they fell, like wayward butterflies, or maybe like the individual words of a poem, and they floated on the water.

It was an afternoon that was more summer than fall, bright golden and warm. My husband had brought his water shoes along, and he immediately put them on and waded into the river, where he stood smiling in the sun. Our swimming days may be done for the season, but there's still plenty of time for wading. Alas, I hadn't brought my own water shoes along, or I'd have been in the water with him instead of taking pictures from the shore.

One of the neatest parts about the trail along the Little Juniata is the railroad bridges. They are made of intricate stonework, and I always admire the patterns and shapes of them. On occasion, I like to use them to frame my shots of the river.

Lit by the perfect afternoon light, the bridges seemed like they were not just bridges any longer, but something more. The building blocks of medieval churches, perhaps. Arches made of stone, beautiful patterns and shapes, row upon row of rock. The golden light revealed their true nature: they were cathedrals of the sun.

I named this picture before I chose the tune to go with it. In my mind, I could hear a Suzanne Vega song with the word cathedral in it, and that's what I wanted to include with this shot. It turns out the name of the song is Gypsy, which is a fine name for a tune. And so it was that my husband and I became a pair of gypsies, for just one sweet, summery October afternoon, hanging out by the river, enjoying the golden cathedrals of the sun.

P.S. What follows is a bizarre footnote to the fox vs. skunk story that began our day. Of course, I did some research on skunks and foxes, hoping to learn more about them both. A fox vs. skunk battle to the death? In my nearly 50 years, I've never even heard of such a thing.

It turns out that (according to Wikipedia), most predators seldom attack skunks, out of fear of being sprayed. The exceptions are dogs, who apparently don't know any better, and . . . (you won't believe this, as I didn't!) . . . the great horned owl. Look at this truly awesome sentence, which I found in Wikipedia: "[The great horned owl] is the skunk's only regular predator. In one case, the remains of 57 striped skunks were found in a single owl nest."

You know, I thought about this, and I thought about this. I have never heard of a skunk being taken by an owl. I imagine I am unlikely to see such a thing either, as such predation must occur at night, when owls and skunks are out and about, but when I am (usually) asleep. Unless a terrible battle is being waged outside my bedroom window, of course. But let logic guide you to help you imagine the scene which sent me into paroxysms of laughter. (No, death is never a funny thing, and we generally do not joke about it, but in a second you'll see why.)

You see, one of the other strange things that happened on this day was that as we drove through Warriors Mark, we saw a hawk, its pale, creamy belly shining in the sun, drop with lightning speed and snatch a small bird from one of the yards in town. My last view was of the hawk flying away with the bird in its clutches. "Why didn't the little bird fight back?" I asked my husband. "Maybe it COULDN'T," he replied.

But a skunk, nabbed by a flying creature, would most certainly fight back in the one way it knows how. My mind boggles to think that sometimes . . . late at night . . . (and somebody somewhere MUST have seen this) a great horned owl bears its prize aloft, carrying a skunk through the air, with the skunk spraying and spraying like a cropduster. (Look out, foxes, and everybody else below!!!!!) I don't know about you, but from now on, if I ever see an owl with something in its talons, I am making sure that I am far, far away . . .