I find an old friend on the Outer Point Beach. A belted kingfisher watches from a perch on offshore rock as Aki and I emerge from the old growth. Aki and the bird ignore each other. He might be ignoring me as I walk slowly toward him to get a better photograph. I love this bird with its spear of a bill and mullet topknot. I like his feisty verbal challenges and goofy way he flies: up with a frantic beat of wings like a hummingbird then down in a dipping glide.

Twenty years ago on Prince of Wales Island a cloud of kingfishers circled my kayak and dived on a school of baitfish. The birds tucked in their wings and penetrated to a surprisingly deep depth, their passage marked by a line of bubbles in the water. I felt fear, wonder, and privileged to witness their casual demonstration of skill. I wanted to share it. I wanted to enhance the experiences value through secrecy. I never saw such a thing again.

You might say the devil is beating his wife this morning if your devil, when angry, grows yellow like the sun and his beaten wife can shed enough tears to soak little Aki and wash the trail clean. I prefer the idea that Akria Kurosawa illustrated in his movie, Dreams: that rain and sun share the skies over fox weddings. As my Aki, the little poodle mix, and I trot along the lower Mendenhall River, I root for the sun to muscle aside the rain clouds that have been camped out over Juneau for more than a week.

The tide is on the flood and in minutes it will cut off our retreat from the riverside beach if we don’t turn back. It has already eliminated the last mud bar in the wetlands and forced an armada of ravens to fly over us to roost in tall spruce. Now they mutter curses at the tide, each other, and maybe us. If they cast criticism of the little dog’s fleece wrap, she ignores it.

It’s early morning on a tidal meadow but we could be walking through downtown Los Angeles at sunrise. Canada geese, all locals, huddle like the homeless in protected dips of the meadow. Some make low complaints, as refugees from mental health treatment sometimes mutter to themselves while pushing a shopping cart of castoffs down the street.

If the geese represent the homeless of our cities, Aki and I are seen by them as police officers; my camera a baton to encourage them to move along from the protected doorways where they huddled for the night. Aki tries to ignore the big birds while I photograph them. I also take pictures of still-white peaks of the Chilkat Range reflected on the surface of Eagle River.

Tired of making geese nervous, I lead my little dog into the woods where we are greeted by a red-breasted sapsucker hammering away at a metal trail sign. I saw one of his brothers doing the same to a “No Motor Vehicles on the Trail” sign yesterday. Are the beautiful woodpeckers uniting against the man? As cops Aki and I should investigate further but the sapsucker flies off before I can question him.