"I need you to walk with me... you have to see this..."

This is what the man of mine said right after lunch on Sunday.

This sometimes means that I'm gonna be gone a L O N G time...

...but lately, I've wandered the woods a bit myself, contemplating and thinking, and I've kept thinking that I should have taken the camera, so I grabbed the camera and he and I set out.

What he wanted me to see was the persimmon tree.  Just outside the yard, behind the chicken coops, there's a large old persimmon tree.  It escaped the naughty horse habit of chewing on trees that one of our girls employed to do in the other old persimmon trees in the close perimeter of the house.

Persimmons are beautiful fruits, bitterly acerbic until the cooler autumn temperatures render them pungent and sweet, their thick pudding like interior a cleverly hidden secret behind the wrinkled paper thin skins.

 There's a bumper crop this year.  We picked enough to make some muffins, but most are not yet ripe enough for anything but mischief making.

 I love sweetgum balls!

 I love climbing the 'climbing tree'.  It's a large old sourwood tree with three distinct 'stories' to it and lovely horizontal limbs, large enough to lay down upon,,, just perfect for lazy afternoons and a book...
(Note that the cat has come on the walk... she thinks she's a dog!)

 Yes, at 50, we're still climbing trees!

 I love little trees... three inches tall.

 I love old trees, which are no longer living, but hosting the living.

 I love the wild wood ferns.

 And the supreme silky softness of lamb's ear.

 And prickly pine cones...

 and wild turkey feathers.

Wild oats.

We had animal companions on our walk.

 Bailey, in the sunbeams and the river.

 Bailey and Nana on the romp!

 Serious romping of large dog... 

muddy, wet, romping...

 Momentary calmness.

 Booger is cleverly hidden.

 The barn kitten who likes to go on walks.

 Booger walked many miles... running ahead, back to us...

running ahead... back to us.

 Both young creatures were 'new' to the river, 

the smells, the sandy beach, the interesting things to dig.

She passed her swim test.

 Not yet showing the fall colors, but still, quiet water.

 

Home again.