Spring walk and I didn't bring my camera

It's finally been fairly warm and I've finally felt like going on walks again. I put on my new walking shoes and hit the sidewalks. The neighborhood was almost Rockwellian, and I spent every other step kicking myself for leaving my camera at home.

My neighbor Shawn was out raking with a vintage implement he got at an auction. You should have seen this thing. It looked more like an instrument of torture than a rake, but it was getting the job done. I told him for the 100th time to keep an eye out for more important things at auctions, like Jadeite. "Is that the green stuff?" he asked, for the 100th time. Funny guy.

Brutus The Great Big Black Cat and his person, Rich, were also out for a stroll. Brutus hunkers down in the dirt, eats grass, gets tangled in the shrubs, stretches out on the sidewalk, rolls in the gutter. Brutus is getting up there in age and doesn't do much walking anymore, so Rich just holds the leash to Brutus' harness and reads a book. Rich thinks this summer he'll delve deeper into Louis L'Amour. Perfect cat-walking literature.

Two other neighborhood cats — the fluffy calico who lives in the house with gingerbread trim and the little silky black cat with the white bib who lives down the street — came running up to rub on my legs and send greetings to the Kortuem Cats. I got a good sniff-over when I got home. We're glad everybody made it through the winter.

And the sidewalks. This wasn't just your regular hopscotch and scribbles. This was high art. There was a solar system, a bunch of things I think were Easter bunnies and eggs and a whole village of little kids in outline.

Spring is here. Happy Easter.