Thunder greeted me this morning.

Not the loud clap that makes you wonder what’s going on with the gods up there in the sky. Are they restless? Pissed off? Fighting with each other? In the throes of a bowling tournament?

No, this was that low, slow, rumbling thunder, like the distant sound of a train passing through.

When the calendar flips over to September, I think autumn has arrived, even though it isn’t official (according to the gods) until the equinox, still a couple of weeks away.

The weather up here in my corner of the northwest is cooperating with my rhythm of the seasons—a beautiful rainy day.

A quail family has taken up residence in my front yard. Or maybe I’ve taken up residence in theirs. There are seven little ones and I assume the mother who watches over them as they peck away at the ground. I don’t know what they are foraging for, but they seem to be successful.

They don’t seem to mind the thunder.

They are old enough to fly. I’ve seen them take flight if I surprise them, or they surprise me, when I step out of the door. I don’t know how old they are. I’m surprised that theses babies are here now. I would have thought they would have been born in the spring, would be big enough to leave the nest by now. They seem less fuzzy today than they did a few days ago.

But, I don’t know anything about quails. Other than I am glad they are in my front yard and that the window seems to make me invisible to them.

Falling leaves remind us that change is the only constant.
From the Autumn card of the Wisdom of the Crone cards

I have been in my new Northwest home for close to a season now. Summer has always seemed to me to be a time of letting things grow, letting things settle, and then autumn is the time to harvest.

I feel settled up here in the Northwest. I never thought I would be anything but a Californian. I love California, but this is my new home. I have found a peace I have long searched for. Perhaps it’s the air. Perhaps it’s having the time to be still—to watch quails forage in my yard.

Had dinner with new friends last night. Like us, they are California transplants. It looks like the time is right to start a Saturday Salon up here. They think the ground is fertile for it.

So, that will be what I will harvest. A new place where something happens so something else can happen.

The quail family scurried down the long driveway, disappearing around the curves. Lunch was over?

I have grown very fond of that mother quail. She does such a good job with her little chicks. I want the world to be safe for them. I can’t, nor do I want to, protect them from the natural world. I’m sure there are predators who are their enemy.

But I would like them to be safe from the hubris of man.

As the thunder rolls through again, I’m grateful that I can take a respite from the world that rages outside.