I’ve quoted William deBuys in my posts and on other Wisdom Wednesdays before. I love this author and highly recommend his books. For me, The Walk has been deeply inspiring, affecting how I walk on my land. This passage came to mind because the coyotes have been so vocal lately. Whatever I am doing I stop and listen. They are an expression of the wildness that survives, still, in parts of the world. I am grateful they are my neighbors (Morning Light with Coyote).
William deBuys from his book, The Walk:
Coyotes have been common here seemingly forever. From my first days in this valley, their mad songs have been a particular joy of early summer. It may be as late as June when the year’s pups leave the dens where they were whelped and begin to rove with the rest of the pack through the half-light of dawn and dusk. They soon join the adults in serenade, or try to, and the result can be bizarre. The pups haven’t yet learned to sing. Their voices crack; they fail to hold the pitch or complete the phrase; they moan and hoot, sounding like tomcats or owls. Their inexperience briefly fills the valley with a spirit of comedy. You stop and smile. You wonder if the ravens are amused, or if the slow-witted gophers peer dimly from their burrows wondering if their oppressors are finally dying or insane. The episode passes in a moment, but a spirit of absurdity hangs in the air as the echoes of the botched concert fade. You realize that even the orchestra of nature needs tuning once in awhile. And gradually the tuning is achieved. The incompetence of the coyote pups lasts only an outing or two. Soon they get the hang of singing like the big dogs so that the daily yipping and yowling that echoes through the valley reacquires its practiced character and again embodies, as perfectly as any sound on earth, a rhapsody of wildness.
Love to you all,
Jeane
Neat and interesting story. I start to chuckle imagining what those sounds of the pups must sound like and would love to hear this experience myself! I love wolves myself. Find them to be an interesting breed. They mate for life and are to me a beautiful looking animal. I wonder how similar they are to coyotes? Thanks for the short story and it must be interesting for you to listen to them on your land! Take Care, Cin =)
I’ve almost recorded them to post on the blog. Maybe I’ll do that one of these days.
Anna used to live with a wolf. Her stories are amazing. I think wolves and coyotes must share a lot of similarities. There used to be a blog called The Daily Coyote about a woman who lived with a coyote. I read her book and her stories are similar to Anna’s about living with Sheba.
That would be a neat post if you could record them one day! I know I would enjoy it!
I’ll try to remember to do that when they’re really loud one night. I usually get so caught up in the sound I don’t think of doing it until they’re done. One of these days, though, you never know…