Night Vision

 

I have awful night vision.

And with the end of Daylight Savings Time, the darkness feels really dark, and it always arrives before I'm ready for it.

 

But, my elderly Jack Russell, Mr. Pip,

HAS TO HAVE a late-night constitutional if I want an accident-free dawn. So, every night I bundle up against the cold and try to figure out which way he's headed. It's like snipe hunting at summer camp.

 

Fortunately, I have a fancy flashlight.

 

Last night when we were out, I heard a cat crying.

and immediately, my mind built a story about a tiny calico cat, stuck way up in a tree, scared to death in the pitch-black night.

 

I opened the back gate and wobbled partway down the river bank,

balanced myself on a granite outcropping, shone my light this way and that and called, "Here kitty, kitty, kitty!" My calls were met with silence.

 

But the movement disoriented me.

The riverbank no longer felt like my domain. I struggled to make sense of trees and granite outcroppings, while grapevines as thick as my wrist swayed in the wind like rainforest anacondas looking for a snack.

 

My heart was pounding, I began to sweat.

Footsteps crunched in the leaves behind me!

 

What was that?

I focused my light on the ground behind me, only to see Mr. Pip carefully tiptoeing toward me.

 

My flashlight hit a poplar tree, and two enormous eyes blinked at me.

Aha! There was the cat!

 

Only the eyes didn't belong to a cat.

I was staring into the face of a juvenile screech owl. His grey ear tufts blended perfectly with the grey of the tree bark.

 

We blinked at each other,

and he flew on silent wings in a huff.

 

I slowly climbed back up the bank,

through the English ivy and wild rose briars that clung to my pants. I made it into the yard, and closed the gate.

 

There's a lot of winter left.

The nights are dark and sometimes the days feel even darker so I'm grateful for my flashlight.

It's always a good thing to have some night vision.