Daydreams

I had hardly given it much thought lately.
Aside from catching his eyeshine in the beam of my flashlight last week as I rounded the pond late one evening, the fox that I’d hoped to, one day, encounter face to face, has been keeping a low profile.
The tracks that led me, winding and creeping through freshly fallen snow in late February, now, as May’s return of life surges forward, are nearly forgotten. The snowy depressions--drag marks where he’d caught his prey and carried it yards from our wooded creek bank and off through the field—I’d translated in my mind to imagine a male might be hunting for his mate and young, resting somewhere, within a den.
Without ever seeing more than footprints, it remained but a romantic notion in my head.
Fueled by a dream that, hidden from harm, a sweet family of foxes was growing.



In the stillness of a new day’s dawning--dreams really do come true.

Apologies for the fuzzy images.
It was barely daylight, and I wanted be sure to keep my distance and not spook them with a flash.