Window on the World

Sometimes you go to the shot, and sometimes the shot comes to you. The other day, my wife was in the kitchen and glanced out the window and there it was, a great white heron.

I quickly grabbed my camera and took several pictures of this magnificent bird, who had alighted upon the hedge that screens our home from the road outside. The bird seemed oblivious to our presence on the other side of the windows, where we could see it from both the kitchen and my new "man cave" which also faced north.

In my prior "window on the world" at the tennis resort condo, I had converted the second bedroom into an office, where I faced a courtyard and had an oblique view of the Inter-coastal Waterway and Sarasota Bay. No water views in the new place, but our new neighborhood earns its name, Winding Oaks. This area, built in 1988, was carved out of an area where many live oak trees (that's the name of the species, as opposed to dead oaks) were incorporated into the landscaping plan surrounding the homes. Live oaks are native to this area, as are great white herons. I am now native to this area, and living on the corner where my windows face north and west gives me one great view of what's coming and who's going. I've achieved nirvana if you rank neighborhood busybody as a goal.