Joe and I went to a local nature park today, a nice little one where there aren't any signs that say you shouldn't go down in the water to tick off the bugs and worms and other creatures that really probably pretty much wish you would just Stay A Higher Life Form And Stop Bothering Them.
So we bothered a bunch of creatures. We looked at the damselfly nymphs and the little worms and the frogs and the whirligig beetles who Failed To Get Away. Also at the water striders. And I think my favorite, the "Small Unidentified Creatures." The word "rotifers" springs to mind, but heaven knows why. Pinnipeds. Homophones. Whatever.
There were also snails. Snails! What is this, a mangrove swamp? Their shells were transparent, or at least translucent, and they slooged down grassblades for all the world like alien creatures of Great Wisdom. Which they weren't.
Joe told me what a wonderful time he had. We saw a blue-winged warbler. That's three for me, ever. They are so beautiful, as beautiful as a pickle jar with a frog in it, and as cherries pitted while you sit on a board walk where an iris is blooming.