Mile 576. After the rain.

All forms of life on the Trail welcome sunshine after five days of deluge.

A mother turkey leads her five gangly gray chicks for a walk down the Trail in front of me.   They have been inside far too long.   Fresh air melts away residual tension of the wet.

Billows of white blackberry blossom stretch across the turkey family’s path.   The warmth releases its subtly sweet scent - a pear mixed with a honey that fluffy yellow bees savor as much as I do.   

A Great Blue Heron poses in the gurgling creek below me.   With his long gray neck and spindly legs, he perches on his favorite rock.   His slate-blue wings are spread, motionless, basking in the warmth.

In the grassy field to the right of the three-sided shelter, through-hikers lay out their gear to dry.   Colorful patches of blue sleeping quilts and white dyneema tents and magenta puffy coats stand out against the bright spring green.

On the weathered wooden fence post to my left, a Great Spangled Fritillary butterfly flaps her orange speckled wings slowly, like a Southern lady on a hot summer day.   

She senses my admiration and likes the attention.   She slows her flapping to show off for my camera lens.   

“You can admire me closer, if you’d like,” her antennae beckon.  I gently reach out my hand.  And she climbs aboard, her tender legs gripping my fingers.

She continues to flap, showing off, beckoning.  I hold my breath.

After her photo session, she flies into the sun above the bright spring green patchwork field.