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A Red-Winged Raccoon

The housecleaners were here, and they seem to look at me as a project beyond them, so I said to Mari that I was going to take my camera and drive to the Swamp.  

 It really isn't called the Swamp.  It is called Sweetwater Wetlands, where sewer water is processed, and some of which has been used to create an oasis for birds and turtles and ornithologists.  "Sweet" the water cannot possibly be, judging by the look of it, but the reeds and rushes thrive, and the turtles seem not to be fastidious.  

 Just to clarify that I am not a birder--I just want to take pictures of something--I shall show you the two birds I saw today.


Just as I was leaving, I met a couple from Washington State, and I, a native Washingtonian, instantly knew that they would be friendly, and intelligent, and water-logged.  Besides, he had a camera lens I have been lusting after.  After learning that I lived here in Tucson, they said they had seen . . . oh, I dunno, a Harris' Hawk, a Yellow-rumped Warbler, some sparrows, coots, and so on.  

 I said I had seen a raccoon.  I did not mention the Red-Winged Blackbird because I had to establish that I was not a birder, and only knew two or three birds by sight.  

 As they drove off, I promised myself, again, that I was going to learn the names of some birds so that I could recite them at such times.  Names like the Red-Billed Oxpecker, and the Kori Bustard, and the Jack Snipe.  Maybe a Common Shag, or the Rough-Faced Shag.  A Hoary Puffleg.  Dickcissel.  Bushtit.  And when I learn to spell it, perhaps the Oleaginous Hemispingus.  

 Birders are an intimidating lot.  I have to find a way to make small talk with them; seem interested in pointing at something deep into a tree, and whispering to other people.  

 On the drive home, I heard a commercial for a men's clinic.  Low-T, and all that.  The doctor's name was Arakaki.  

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