Our latest North Pacific storm has cloaked the mountains that line Gastineau Channel. It also weighed down the Treadwell Woods with rain. Normally quiet water courses sing, as do the forest thrush. It’s a day for the small beauties.

            Rain drops on leaves and flowers always sparkle, even on gray days. It’s as if collect and hold all the spare light. Wet sleeves coat the young chocolate lily blossoms, making they shine like a pebble shines when still damp from the ocean. I know that if plucked and carried home, the beauty of the flowers will fade like that of a pebble fades as it dries. They will never be as fine as they are when soaked by a storm. 

            A disheveled bald eagle watches Aki and I leave the sheltering woods and walk onto Sandy Beach. It huddles on the roof of the old mine ventilation shaft, protected from over-interested humans and dogs by the high tide. The eagle turns it back on us when I focus the camera on it, apparently not wanting anyone to take a picture of it with its back feathers all ahoo.