I can feel the change. If you lived here, you would walk outside and think I’m nuts. It’s unbearably hot and humid today. But I still see the trees fading – their deep emerald green is fading to a more muted and tired tone. Everything seems tired. The horses and dogs are tired of the heat. The garden is struggling. I’ve pulled the cucumbers and yellow squash. The tomatoes and eggplants have slowed down. The only thing really thriving right now are the zinnias.

But in my soul I feel the coming fall and sense the season’s change. I feel like a child clasping their hands and hopping up and down with excitement. Except instead of Santa Claus or Halloween I’m looking forward to open windows, fall colors, crisp air, baking, and long walks kicking up leaves.

And yet part of me is struggling to soak up this last bit of summer. I was reading a Gladys Taber book last night and came upon this passage. I absolutely loved it. I hope you do too — but I guess if you live in a place like Florida, it might be hard to imagine how wonderful this would be!

“I wish we could put up this late summer sunlight in jars. If we could only pack it, clamp the bail down on the glass, set the pressure cooker for say, ten pounds, and process jars and jars of bright, fresh, mellow sun! I can see it would look with the jars ranged in the fruit cellar beside the chicken and piccalilli and tomato catsup. And on a dark January day we would bring up a quart or so of sunshine and open it and smell again the warm dreamy air of a late summer day.” — The Book of Stillmeadow by Gladys Taber

But this story is about Cecilia Tidyhorn and her friendship with Jenny Springtail.

Now, whether Cecilia gets her gentleness from the family or they get their gentleness from her no one quite knows. But at any rate Cecilia is immensely gentle and patient — just the sort of friend Jenny needed one cold spring day.

Jenny had had one of THOSE mornings. The baby bunnies were crying, nobody could find any clean socks, she had burnt the carrot mush for breakfast, her husband was still sleeping and her oldest daughter had declared that she wasn’t going to finish school but wanted to travel to this place called “Out West.”  Suddenly it all became too much. Jenny dropped the baby bunnies at her mama’s and shot across the pastures like a lightning bolt.

Her eyes were stinging from tears and her heart was pounding when she finally stopped. She found herself in a strange field looking straight up at a cow’s behind.

Cecilia turned her head and casually introduced herself. Jenny had never seen a cow before, and had no idea what to do. Her first instinct was to freeze. Cecilia introduced herself again and waited, blinking her liquid brown eyes and chewing her cud. Jenny finally stammered out her own name and apologized for startling the cow. Cecilia just blinked again and said it was nice to have company.

The more the cow blinked the more Jenny talked. The more Jenny poured out her troubles and broken dreams the more the cow blinked and listened. When her story was finally over Jenny sank into the grass, exhausted and deflated.

Cecilia finished chewing her cud.

“You know,” Cecilia said languidly, “Your life isn’t over yet. If you need more than carrot mush and crying babies to make you happy then change something. You are a grown rabbit and you don’t need anyone’s permission to be happy. What would make you happy?”

“Poetry.” Jenny whispered. “I want to read and write poetry again.”

Jenny stayed most of that day. They talked and ate grass for hours. It was the start of a wonderful new friendship. From that day on Jenny would visit Cecilia every week. Cecilia would blink. Jenny would talk or read her poetry. Cecilia had company while she ate and Jenny had someone to listen. Oddly enough, Jenny never burned the carrot mush again.

All winter long the soggy bottomland of Foxley Hill is still and quiet. The birds have left and the frogs have buried themselves deep in the mud. Nothing stirs and the snow melt is clear and lifeless. The animals of Foxley Hill have grown used to the quiet. Then suddenly, without warning, on a fine March day the swamp erupts into a non-stop ruckus – a choir of cacophony.  With this onslaught to their ears, the animals know two things:  (1) the Colonel has arrived, and (2) winter is officially over.

“Who is The Colonel?” you ask. He is a very loud, very distinguished and very handsome Red-Winged Blackbird. It is his duty to protect the swamp – a job he takes very seriously. He is also a bit of a ladies man, enticing half a dozen female Red-winged Blackbirds to share the swamp with him.  He is Colonel Robert A. Redwing, Commander of the Skies, Northern Territory Division.

The Colonel has been watching the signs down south where he winters in the swamps of western Louisiana. Just when the bugs get a little too thick and the alligators a little too active from the warming sun, he decides it’s time to go home. It takes him a couple weeks to make the 1,130 mile trip from Starks, La., to Foxley Hill. And by the time he arrives home he wants the whole of Foxley Hill to know it!

Waving his Official Papers about he trills and yells and dive-bombs any moving target. He constantly calls out “Hear me now! I Colonel Robert Redwing have declared this to be my summer territory!”  Woe to any unsuspecting animal who hasn’t been warned of his arrival! They soon get a peck on the head or at the very least a frightful start. Eventually all the new noise in the swamp rouses the sleeping frogs who then join in the spring chorus with their peeping. With their combined song, winter is officially declared to be over.

Roberta J. Foxley sighs to herself every year at The Colonel’s arrival. As land owner she is expected to go and greet the Bearer and Decider of Spring. She just wishes she didn’t have to watch her head in order to do it! “I mean really, why couldn’t the robins arrive first and bring spring? They’re such a chipper bunch.” 

It wasn’t supposed to snow this particular morning. It was the middle of March. And while snow is always a possibility this time of year in the midwest, it hadn’t felt like snow. So imagine our friend Lestor Morenut’s surprise this particular morning.

Lestor had dressed in his finest tie (he had an early meeting with Roberta – the landowner), made his cup of nut coffee and peeked outside his door. Ugh! Snow!!! At the rate this snow was falling the ground would be covered in no time. He quickly went through his mental list of where all his nuts were stored. He was prepared and ready for this storm. He thought about his clients, all of whom had carefully stored their nuts according to plan. They would be fine too.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a flash of gray. Of course there was Old Jeremy Curlflick — running around like a chicken with his head cut off, looking for food. Some squirrels just never learn.

Lestor rolled his eyes and went back inside to pour out the rest of his coffee. Because of the meeting with Roberta he didn’t have the luxury of crawling back into bed. But at least he didn’t have to panic about having enough food to last the storm.

Foxley Hill is Roberta J. Foxley’s home. Her family has lived on this 330 acres for 18 generations. She is the last of the Foxleys. An independent vixen, she is unsure if she wants to continue the family tradition by having kits and staying put. The modern world is calling to Roberta J. The world is full of possibilities. As she hasn’t made up her mind yet, we’ll just have to wait and see what she decides to do.

In the meantime, other animals live here too. There are the Acornsons – a family of red squirrels – that live in the spruce tree where the old farmhouse used to be. The gray squirrels are too numerous to mention, but you’ll probably get to meet Lestor Morenuts and Jeremy Curlflick.

You might meet the Owleys if you wander down to the South Silo where they make their home. Nancy Owley is nothing but a fussbudget and talks non-stop, always laughing. Matthew O. Owley is much more serious, but he does love Nancy. Matthew is the local judge and is known to be an owl of few words.

I hope you come back to check in from time to time. With Wi-Fi and the internet, we’re entering a new age for animals.  A lot is going on here at Foxley Hill.

Jenny Springtail was going through some old pictures, diary entries and the like when she found this image. Immediately she was taken back to a beautiful spring day a couple of years ago. There he was, Hal Swampwater, the most poetic frog she ever knew.

That spring her mother had been after her to, “Find a nice young rabbit. Start a family. Get a job.” Jenny would have none of it, for it was a glorious spring that year. The kind where all the blooms seem to happen at once and the sun never stops shining and all the breezes are mild. In Jenny’s mind, that kind of weather would be wasted on family-starting or job-hunting. Instead, every morning she and Hal hopped down to the Hidden Fish Pond. There they would twist flowers into wreaths and necklaces and talk about REAL things like love, hopes, and dreams.

Jenny didn’t know it then but Hal had fallen head over heels in love with her. His heart nearly broke in half when she married Ted – a large buck rabbit – in September. Looking back, Jenny could see that Hal loved her. But it was too late now.

Jenny sighed, put away her old diary and drawings and looked out the window. If only she could have one more spring like that.