The coldest morning since May, with an inversion layer bringing sound from the east—the slightly quieter direction. The Carolina wren duets with beeping quarry trucks.
trucks
6/28/2024
Clear and cold. The beeps of quarry trucks mingle with the shrill calls of red-bellied woodpeckers. Two hummingbirds in a high-speed chase fly out of the woods and up over the house.
6/13/2024
A crow gurgling in dispute to the east, a jake-breaking truck to the west… the wood thrush with his pure, bell-like notes gets no respect.
9/23/2023
Overcast and still, with a low rumble of traffic from the east. In the half-light, a deer’s ear pivots among the goldenrod.
9/22/2023
Cool but not quite as clear, with a thin, high scrim of clouds and the incessant beeping of quarry trucks, to which a migrant phoebe briefly responds.
5/12/2023
A turkey hunter’s pickup rumbles past. The moon pale as a glowworm glimmers in the treetops as a whippoorwill clears his throat.
3/16/2023
Sunrise into slow-moving cirrus; the light dulls like the eyes of a dying fish. In the windless calm, the long gargle of an 18-wheeler descending an exit.
2/22/2023
Just enough thinning of clouds for a classic, red-in-the-morning wash of mauve in the east, where quarry trucks are loud with their first loads.
11/3/2022
Cold and clear at sunrise, with sound out of the east: the quarry’s daily grind instead of the interstate. A jay answers a reverse-beeping truck.
12/27/2021
Heavily overcast, with the background rumble of industry: a whole Monday-after-Christmas mood. A raven’s hoarse commentary.
12/16/2021
Clear at dawn. The extended gargle of a jake-braking truck. A crow flies silently overhead and returns a minute later with its call.
9/10/2021
In one hole in the clouds a meteor; in another the dawn. The scattered notes of night-flying migrants coming down to roost. A quarry truck beeping.
9/18/2020
First light. Ghostly figures in the meadow shrink into common snakeroot. The distant gargle of a truck jake-breaking off the interstate.
3/1/2020
So clear and bright I can see a strand of spider silk still flying from the eaves. The rumble of our neighbor’s truck breaks the silence.