Waiting for the Weather

End of October and it was a mild (60-70 F) day with morning fog early and solid overcast the rest of the day. I went out to the Woods' NW Ponds entrance at 6:15 for a twilight walk. The forest seemed like it was on hold, waiting for the rain forecast for tonight and the next two days. The NW pond was quiet.. no turtles or odonates at the end of the day. Maybe 0.6 feet in depth. I have to clean the post. I found three deer, one yearling leaping away; and two older does by the Big Tree grove. The older does were more curious than skittish. I wondered if they were yearlings I saw with their mother in the Woods in previous years.. and if so, if they have any memory of me and my grey woods coat. The big cottonwoods still have 80-90% of their leaves; but in the small-diameter, crowded green ash stands, 90% of the leaves are down. Walking southwest from the Big Tree Grove in summer, I would come into denser shade, approaching the thick green ash. Now the canopy brightened with open sky. Through the Woods, tree crickets are trilling. Circling back north along the West Trail, I love the band of green woods light from the western boundary, coming through the forest at sunset or later. It silhouettes the dark trunks of the larger elms, ash and oaks in the woods for a brief time before night falls.