Spring in the Air

Spring was in the air Sunday and the wife and I, sensing May showers, decided to make our Rockport walk a shortie. We had birds in the back of our minds -- birds in the belfry, so to speak. So we headed up the street, bore to the right and skimmered along the cemetery wall into the Southern Woods.

Right on our own street we espied a yard of gold to those who love dandelion greens with vinegar. There they were waiting for the knife--and a lame back, of course. There were nice fat worms pushing their way out of the ground ready for some young angler. The world was full of them.

Into the woods, a bright blue butterfly fluttered before us only to blend into the ground as it closed its colored wings. A robin popped along as if to herald our meanderings. But nothing so commonplace concerned us. We were out for much bigger game in the aviary realm. Kieran wasn't going to top us.

Off in the distance we could hear a flock of hens pushing hard for Johnny Main, retired Navy man turned poultryman, whose good eggs find themselves on the spotless skillets of the Gloucester House, we hear.

It was a fine road for woods walking, nice and wide, and graveled, partly to allow farm vehicles down through it, more to allow progress of gravel pit trucks. Wonder of wonders -- we actually met a family on a hike, we who so many Sundays have been used to walking alone. Except that the man of the house had stooped so low as to carry a cane, that's hardly cricket -- shanks mare permits of no such support.

Charred trees stood stark along the bank where a huge boulder perched precariously on the side of a slope, ready to fall down the incline by a mere touch. A frog piped its discontent over the whole situation.

And then we saw them: birds in the ecstasy of flight, and alert to the world. First, the finches, fast and bewildering, almost too quick for our eyes. Large crows, even larger sea gulls, out of their element, were everywhere and just as clamorous. We yet had to see the unusual types that birders crow about. Looking earthward, we were confronted with large beds of lily of the valley under the pines.

Then we scored. We had come to a thicket in a depression. We heard a tremendous rustling and thought for a moment we might see a forest animal battling his way through -- perhaps a beaver or even a fox. But peering close into the bracken, we could spot a bevy of small birds. Our old eyes were too dimmed to keep pace with their speed. We wished for the eyes and ears of an expert. We were reminded of such an expert, Esther Johnson, Rockport's town clerk, warning us that "the warblers are an amateur birder's despair." We now knew what she meant.

We comforted ourselves by noting that the blueberry bushes were thick with promise and that one of the solaces of Rockport's woods is that gentle but thunderous roar of the ocean in the background. The sea and the forest are cousins in comforting sound.

Wild strawberries and marsh marigolds lined our path. And then into the clearing was the blatant mooing of cows, a fine herd, well kept, belonging to Kenny Rowe, whose barn top sported a starry windmill. And it was a bright red barn, too.

Up through Jerden's Lane past the bright new school, and along South Street where in Mrs. Powers' backyard we saw a prize bird, a real big pheasant, being flushed by, of all critters, her good cat from Hong Kong. He was showing his rich Tartar blood, no less!

The wife and I keep discovering iron fences in Rockport. On this stroll we bumped into one on the Masons' property on Norwood Avenue. 'Tis a beauty, that it is. And still another on Main Street, across from Beach Street. And Paul Dow reminds us that his wrought iron fence once graced the property of Odd Fellows Hall right next to our own property.

The way was fast approaching our own little home, down past Caleb's Lane, Cove Hill, into Dock Square, up good old Broadway and the hidden garden. There's real peace in Rockport.

J.P.C., Jr.