It was one of those fall days that hide the harsh reality just around the calendar corner. Crisp sunlight, colors popping from the leaves of the maples, birches, poplars and oaks. Tammi, the better half, is on vacation this week. So what better time to go for a ride, "leaf peepin"?
We were headed back home after about a hundred miles of "Ooohing and Aaahing." Crossing the Atkinson Road from Dover-Foxcroft to Bradford, we were on a gravel portion of the road, coming around a corner when I spied movement ahead, just before a small bridge over a beaver flowage. I slowed to a stop and stared hard. "Couldn't be," I muttered. "What?" asked my wife, rousing from that peculiar kind of trance induced by riding in warm sunlight in a closed car, staring at the scenery.
There before us in the road were birds. Over a dozen. Large. Dark. Unmistakable outlines of turkeys. Just like on my whiskey bottle, some of them sported colors! Tom turkeys. And hens, too. I'm guessing they're a harem, with this year's broods included. They, too, were illuminated in shafts of sunlight visible in the eddies of dust raised by the unseen vehicle ahead of us. We sat transfixed as they slowly went about the important business of loading up on the fine gravel needed to break up seeds in their croup. I got out the camera, and slowly edged the car forward. Two shots left on the roll and no more film with us. Damn!
And then they were gone. Not in a hurry, but no time wasted, they got nervous about the intentions of the Grey monster up the road edging closer, and beat feet for the underbrush beside the road. In no time at all it was an empty road, nary a clue that moments before an amazing sight was beheld. I can only hope the pictures actually come out, but I have my doubts. Rarely do we get to record even minor wonders on this ball of mud we call home.
By the way, have I mentioned recently how much I hate the 2500 character limit? It's been over 2 months since we rolled out the AOL Journals to public consumption. When is this going to be fixed? When does the editor get a spell check? Come on, this was stuff we told you about back in July and early August!
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