A passing moment....

I was having kind of a bad day. Everything I needed to do was stalled for one reason or another. I didn't get out to check the mail until about 6:00. As I was coming into the driveway I saw three deer.

They appeared out of nowhere. I saw the flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye. They were all the way by the road at the far end of the neighbor's yard. I know they weren't coming down the road seconds before.

The leader, a young buck with a nice little set of antlers coming in, stopped and looked at me. His eye glittered in the late sun. He held my gaze for a long moment adn then tossed his head and bounded off with his harem of two does following.

I didn't take three steps when something fluttered at my feet. It was a beautiful blue butterfly just sitting there on the ground, slowly flapping its wings. At first I thought the ants had it. They were streaming around it and it looked stunned. I considered trying to rescue it but it fluttered a few inches away at the thought and still it sat and preened like a peacock.

It opened its wings almost flat to the ground and held them for long seconds. I was mesmerized. It let me bend in low to get a good look at its markings. I finally couldn't bear it any longer and decided to try for the camera. I asked it nicely to wait for me. It didn't. But I was glad because that meant it could still fly.

When I came back inside, the phone was ringing..... and everything changed.