Waiting on Woodcock

    The blanket of snow has withered to dirty mounds and rain is creating huge puddles. Our dogs pace anxiously, hoping someone takes a walk them among the fields out back, but they finally have resigned themselves to laying in my office beneath my desk and chair. On a walk earlier, the first patches of bare ground remained frozen and felt like concrete.

    Maybe tomorrow, possibly the day after, or a least sometime soon, the woodcock will show up again. They will do their mating dances over the fields out behind the house and then hide among the weeds along the edges. On the morning walks the dogs will find their scent and point them.

    Spring will have arrived.