Ambushed!

One day last week I lit out for work, traveling a parkless route because I knew I wouldn't have time to stop and enjoy all details of nature around me. Well, Nature was having none of that; if I wouldn't come to her, she would come to me. I saw three neat things on my walk:

1. A fluff-feathered, or maybe weathered, mockingbird atop a hedge, doing a dance I've seen before. It stretched out its wings slightly, and then moved them slowly thus: up, further up, down. Up, further up, down. With the white wing patches, perhaps it's some sort of mockingbird semaphore.

2. A monarch butterfly wafting across an intersection in the crosswalk during the WALK signal. I swear, animals are smarter than people.

3. At the park's outer edge, a black-and-white warbler hopping about on the ground. I'd only ever seen them in more protected areas, so it was odd to watch the little guy act more like a house sparrow on the sidewalk than a nuthatch on a tree trunk. It foraged under the watchful gaze of a nearby rat.

Because I could not stop for Nature, she kindly stopped for me!