Fading foxes
I haven't seen the fox family since the end of May. Either they no longer need use of the den, or they were frightened off by the regular lawn mowing activity. I'm hoping it's the former and not the latter. I had been holding my breath about the whole thing until Monday morning, when I happened to come across a juvenile fox dead on the highway to town. It was too far from the house to be one of "my" foxes, but a fox is a fox, and it reminded me of our furry neighbors who had so abruptly moved away.
My sadness over the matter was lightened a bit during our morning walk today. We had made it to the bridge and were about to turn back for home, and then I saw it: a juvenile fox standing on the gravel shoulder. He or she was staring intently at the tallgrass in the ditch, likely hunting for breakfast. Almost as large as an adult, and wearing the mature coat now, the young fox looked up at us and then ran for cover. Running through life, a fox moves fast, brightening the spring and then fading just as quickly from our lives. Maybe we will see them again; or maybe they will only persist in memory.