We slept in this morning to an unheard-of 9:30. And awoke only then because Jackie and Jillie were nudging us awake. Small they may be and delicate-featured, but when you're in repose and they inadvertently happen to step on you, there's more than enough physical pressure to influence your lazy eyes to open as you groggily acknowledge their presence.

Which meant that we were late setting off with them this morning on our usual early morning ravine hike. They were pretty cheerful about it, in contrast to our slight ill humour. Truth is, Jackie awoke us at 4:30 a.m. once again, having to be let out to the backyard. Second night in a row. Disturbed sleep doesn't make for the best of bedfellows.

But if we  hadn't set out so late we'd never have come across our old friends Rod and Nova. Nova takes Rod out to the ravine three times a day. He's a bundle of energy, a white German Shepherd who loves people and evidently coyotes, as well. Jackie and Jillie have known Nova since they were all three puppies. Rod was out for his second turn in the ravine this morning. He's taking shorter circuits this past year, finding the ascents and descents a little demanding. Nova, on the other hand, looks for distractions and is off and about here and there in the forest interior.

She plays with the coyotes, they indulge in little chase-abouts, it would seem, and  have for quite a while. Rod told us that because he sets out just after six every morning he frequently sees coyotes. Last week on two occasions he saw and  heard a coyote close to where he stood, yipping. He finally deduced that it was alerting another coyote to the presence of people (him). They were protecting coyote pups in a nearby den.

Hard to say how many coyotes the forest accommodates now, whether there's a full pack, a family group whose territory it has become. But we're agreed that the coyotes pose no threat unless they're challenged by dogs chasing after them. And Nova doesn't chase after them, he chases with them for a frolic. Rod told us he watched recently while they ran after one another, Nova and a coyote, up and down one of the hills, five times in quick succession before Nova rejoined him.

Jackie and Jillie are not socially inclined in that manner. They tend to behave aggressively when confronted by a dog they're not familiar with. And we know their reaction on coming across a coyote would be to challenge it, first by barking furiously, then by harassing it, leaping about and growling. Two very small dogs threatening a species quite close to them on the evolutionary scale. The coyotes, to protect themselves would respond and we'd stand the chance of losing one or both of our rash little companions. Therefore, the leashes.

For part of our circuit there appeared quite a few other ravine hikers we've known over the years, but as we ventured further within the forest, their number declined to the point where the last half of our circuit was serene and quiet, none others around -- man nor beast -- but for ourselves. The forest was drying out nicely from the past several weeks of ongoing rain events; no more puddles on the trails, no more glittering drops on the vegetation.

We ambled on past our last ascent to street level, bypassing it to extend our hike just a little further, wanting to see how the wildflowers that grow in some abundance in a forest clearing had coped with the rain. And were rewarded with the sight of large colourful clumps of goldenrod, a few lagging groups of fleabane, clover in flower, plenty of pilotweed still flowering, a few purple loosestrife, Himalayan orchids, and the creme de la creme, black-eyed Susans.

Well then, today being laundry day my favourite old (very old) hot-weather, mosquito-repellent outfit has been salvaged. Tossed into the wash, then the torn leg mended and the outfit ironed, it looks as good as new and will continue to give me good service. As long as I manage not to slip and slide on my knee again descending one of the trails in the forest. My knee now feels pretty good and the ripped-across knee of the pants to the two-piece outfit looks just fine. Mind, my husband obliged by threading the needle for me to enable me to do that mending.

So we went off early this morning though the torn pants were still serviceable pre-mending; one could think of the gaping slash in that worn cotton fabric as being obligingly air-conditioned on a sunny, hot morning, even though when we're tramping through the forest the overhead canopy keeps us well in deep cool shade. We often see people driving up to the entrance to the ravine, parking, opening vehicle doors so their dogs can do a mad dash into the forest for a romp through the trails, and we know just how fortunate we are just to exit our house to walk up the street and into the ravine.

 

As we did today, the day before, the week before that, and before you know it, another year has gone by. The aura of spontaneity will be challenged fairly soon. Already, we can see that we're losing daylight hours. Where previously dusk didn't arrive until well after nine, by eight it now makes its entrance. Nature doesn't consult.

Well, we take it all in stride. Just as we have living with the endless threats associated with the global pandemic. Again, we're more fortunate than so many other people, hard hit when their lives were overturned, the unemployed, those who became ill with the coronavirus, hospitalized and still recovering. The relatively small inconveniences in the need to alter lifestyles that have impacted us can be irritating, but better irritated and coping than the alternative.

So many people are more considerate of others now. And that, I believe, is a result of the concern that everyone feels. Social distancing has placed a weight of responsibility on everyone, and for the most part people have come through, understanding the necessity of keeping some measure of control over community transmission rates. Health experts, epidemiologists and other specialists in disease control are now musing over the possibility that with the arrival of fall and winter the muted number of cases will be set to reverse. 

That will be the anticipated result of people returning to the workforce, which is to say those whose employment won't permit for continued working from home. And the return of students to schoolrooms presents another constant worry about contracting and transmitting the virus. So the potential for community spread is very real, and hospitals are in the process of gearing up to meet the challenge. Their concern is being overwhelmed by sheer numbers.

For us, strolling through the quiet calming atmosphere of the forest is a way of letting such concerns drift off at least temporarily. We watch our two little companions disport themselves, curious about everything they come across, from new odours to the presence of squirrels roaming about the forest floor, and the occasional meet-up with dogs they're familiar with. 

We take special note of the vegetation surrounding us, the trees, some of which are already shedding the occasional leaf that has turned colour; poplar and maple mostly, premature and dismaying as August wears on into September. The thimbleberry shrubs that have offered up ripe, sweet berries for weeks are still putting out their delightful pink blossoms to produce more berries in good time.

Queen Anne's lace is still in bloom, and black-eyed Susans. We see the occasional clump of fleabane, and a few purple loosestrife plants in flower. They've proven not to be the invasive plant that would squeeze out all the native wildflowers; their spread has been minimal. Himalayan orchids, on the other hand have outdone themselves this year in colonizing one of the hillsides of the ravine. And pilotweed has really flourished this year; appearing everywhere, even on people's lawns, their bright yellow flowerheads visibly calling out their colonizing entitlements.

And then, after our lengthy ramble, we turn toward the completion of our circuit through the forest trails and make for home. The rest of the day stretching luxuriously before us to do as we will. Needless to say, that included the laundry, the mending of the pantleg to my 35-year-old summer outfit. I know how old it is because of the special circumstances of its purchase, in Tokyo, at a traditional transparent-roof-enclosed 'mall', an hour's walk from our home in Fuyo Compound.

When we're out in the ravine coasting along the forest trails, my husband often brings up something he's read recently. One of the books he's reading at the present time (he always has several on the go; one to read downstairs relaxing, another a bed-time read before sleep) is a compendium of travellers' tales, from the long distant past to the present. Snippets, really, short passages taken from much longer descriptives of travel exposures and experiences.

This morning, he told me that back in the 16th Century in Thailand there was a tribal custom in an area where, presumably, a chronic food shortage prevailed, that when the elderly among them had grown completely incapable of performing their expected duties normally discharged in benefiting the entire group's social structure, by either working in the fields or preparing meals, or looking after the young, they are 'sold' in a public market for food themselves.

I expressed some skepticism, and when we got home tried to see if I could find an allusion to the practise on line, but found nothing to validate or to reject the story. What I did find, however, was academic studies focusing on times of food scarcity in Britain and Spain and elsewhere in Europe, when cannibalism was practised; people sold in an open market, others hanged for theft, cut down and dismembered; not widely practised particularly, but it did evidently take place according to academic studies.

Another study pointed to the early Crusades of the 11th Century when Christian soldiers butchered and ate Syrian prisoners they captured in a town they had besieged and conquered. The story of this event went back to Britain where most of the soldiers had come from, and was not well received. Some versions were that the commanders of the Crusade forces knew nothing of the atrocities, other that they encouraged it, to build a formidable reputation to make their enemies quake in fear. It all seems so improbable...

Such thoughts roaming through one's mind while out in a natural setting; what could be more incongruous? On the other hand, perhaps there's a connection; that civilizational norms at that time merely scratched the surface of what humanity is capable of. And it provokes the thought that if we are capable of mindless cruelty to other animals, why would we not mount atrocities on other humans? We still do, in many ways, from slave markets in Libya, Eritrea, Burundi, Central African Republic, Mauritania, and other grim places of the world. Not to mention the kind that flourishes underground in Europe and North America.

Thoughts like that don't linger, though. We feel so infinitely distanced from such events. And for us, our minds focus in a relaxed and peaceful manner on the landscape before us. This morning it was an absolutely drenched landscape. Around five in the morning, our sleep was suddenly interrupted with the unmistakable sounds of thunder claps moving toward us at an initially muffled distance, that distance gradually and surprisingly quickly closing in with ear-splitting claps. And, of course, accompanied with copious rain.

Again a vibrant, luminously verdant landscape lay before us, trees still dripping every time a breeze rattled foliage. At eight in the morning the temperature stood at 24C, with deep humidity. In the shade of the forest canopy it was pleasant, that breeze doing its utmost to bring a modicum of relief. My husband picked raspberries and Jackie and Jillie lined themselves up to patiently await their share of the juicy little berries. Alongside the raspberries nicely ripening, are the larger thimbleberry plants whose berries are doing their best to catch up. It won't be long before we're picking freshly ripened thimbleberries.

The impact of the heavy rain on the forest floor is evident in concentric streaks of gathered detritus, washed by the rain from its even coverage of the trail, to rounded lines of clearance interspersed by concentrated piles of detritus. The forest floor had already been challenged to absorb plentiful rain events in the past week, so rain left puddles on the trails, some reflecting the green of the forest trees. Jackie and Jillie can't bear to plod through the accumulated rainwater, though they're curious about its presence. Jillie nimbly passes around it, while her brother stops to sniff its substance before following her route.

And then, back home, to wander briefly about the garden, to note how well the garden pots have fared given the downpour. This year we were unable to plan on our choice of flowering plants to express the colourful beauty we've accustomed ourselves to over the years. There were alternate choices in the absence of our preferences, and some of them turned out very well indeed. In particular, the gigantica begonias planted in some of the garden pots and urns, astonishing us by their robust growth, and their floral production.