Dear friends,
I’ve got a story for you today. It’s the kind of story I like to write - for children sort of but for everyone really, just a story that is both utterly ordinary and personally specific. I’ve been walking at dawn for 15 days and to tell you the truth it’s become so important to me I couldn’t think of anything else I wanted to write about more (though I will say the inclination to write a new story started with imagining a little chipmunk who lives in a maple tree and has a tap for sap in her living room wall and boils syrup for herself and her woodland friends and drinks the sap cold every morning while it runs. This isn’t that story, but please do tell me what her name should be and maybe we’ll have a maple story too). I’ve been writing stories like this since my eldest son was three and would ask me to tell him stories about the animals who gather in the forest and throw little parties or do the same things he does in the day. Perfectly mundane and steadfast as a folktale, it brings me joy to find home in simple, easy stories. I hope you enjoy this ordinary little tale.
Morning People
In the first light of the morning Dell could see soft pink clouds over her head through the just-budding branches of the tree cover. In the dewy air of the morning, she could hear the spring peepers’ brief early chorus, and in the soft breeze of the new day she could smell the river and the moss and the mud. Dell stretched her wings wide and set out to walk. She walked on her two large, webbed feet toward the slow, wide stretch of river eager for her morning swim. She stepped in along the gritty, sandy bank and pushed off to glide over the water, lifting her wings and splashing the cold mountain water on her feathers. She dipped her beak below the surface and drank deeply, the water and air and frogs and clouds enlivening her in the quiet of the dawn. Her work that day was simple, to wander and forage, to swim and rest. From where she paddled Dell heard robins, sparrows, and a phoebe calling out their morning greetings. She could feel the soft movements of the brook trout under her legs and see in the distance two crows alighting on an old apple tree. The sun was growing brighter, reflecting in ripples on the surface of the river where Dell made her way to the edge and climbed out onto the riverbank. She shook out her feathers from head to tail and waited a moment for a breeze to give her lift as she began to run along the sand, flapping her wings and calling out to the new day. “Ooo-eek! Ooo-eek! Ooo-eek!”
Through the just-cracked window in her bedroom, the woman heard the bright, distant call of a wood duck echoing over the low rush of the river and the fading sounds of the morning frogs. The sunrise light just beginning to flood through her curtains, the woman pulled back the covers and slid her feet into the wool slippers waiting beside her bed. She moved through the first steps of her day softly, quietly, relishing the gentleness of the morning’s foggy light and trying hard not to wake any children. She pulled on a soft, worn sweater and a pair of tall, tweedy socks. She set the old kettle on the wood stove and opened the heavy iron door. Too warm to keep the fire going through the days and nights but still cool enough to need one each morning, the woman made quick work of building a new day’s fire, the match lighting the still darkened half of the room where the stove sat. She closed the iron door with a heavy, quiet thunk and turned the dials to let in the air. The woman made her way to the kitchen where she pulled a half gallon jar from the refrigerator and a small red enamel cup from the cupboard. She poured herself a cup of birch sap and sipped the ice-cold, mineral-sweetness from the cold cup in her hands as she readied her tea mug and tied a scarf around her ears. She poured the hot water from the kettle into her mug as the fire crackled at her side and pulled on her boots and jacket. Taking the dog’s leash from the peg hook, she called just above a whisper, “Duck! Come on buddy!”
Duck had been watching the woman’s movements through the morning and was eager and waiting when he heard his name. He sat down in front of the door while the woman hooked the lead to his collar and when the front door opened on the brisk morning, Duck burst forth filling his nose and lungs with the fresh air and abundant scents of the new day. The grass felt cold under his paws and he tugged gently, pulling the woman toward his favorite puddle. He took a few big slurps of frosty puddle water and they turned north toward the cow field to greet the day walking. The roadside grass held scents of coyotes travelling in the night, deer crossing toward the river, and all manner of frogs moving to and fro. Duck was aware of the cows in the field beside him, distant on the hillside eating their morning fill of just-green grass. A breeze blew from the northeast and he picked up his head to experience every smell it carried before trotting on. He buried his nose in a clump of long grass and knew if he could just dig right there he’d find a mole or a mouse, but he was coaxed on by the woman and he was eager to find another puddle and keep his legs moving. When Duck and the woman rounded their loop and turned south again, they walked closer to the river. He smelled birds of all kinds, fresh mud, the wood duck. He got close enough to the old apple tree to turn up an old, dried apple from the autumn and the smell of it made Duck happy. He carried it in his mouth a moment before dropping it as the woman led him down by the river’s shore. Duck eagerly drank from the cold, rushing water, experiencing every sound, sight, and smell he could take in. He watched as the woman cupped her hands to pick up water and pat her face before smiling at him and saying, “Let’s go home!”
As the front door opened, the air inside the house hit the woman’s face and hands with a wash of comfort and warmth. Unlatching Duck’s leash, he ran with purpose toward the cracked bedroom door of the boy. He jumped on the boy’s bed and sniffing his face he saw him start to laugh and heard him say in a groggy morning voice, “Oh Duck! Good morning alright I’m up!” before the boy opened his arms wide and stretched down into his toes under his quilt and looking out the window, began a new day.
P.S. if you liked Morning People, you’d likely like the stories I wrote and Michelle illustrated for our seasonal zine Edie Lune. Each issue includes an illustrated story, recipes, and a handwork project. You can read about Tom and his daffodils in the spring issue, Maeve and the seasong in summer, a troupe of neighborhood kids planning something special in autumn, and Isabel’s moonlit adventure in winter. All four issues are available bundled at a 25% discount, too. xoxo
I loved it! 😍 just wonderful !
This is such a lovely story. My kids and I listened to it as we packed snacks and filled water bottles in preparation for our annual spring hike to a very special rock on a very special lake. It was perfect.
Thank you for recording it - I loved listening!