This morning, the fields near our home were layered in fog. I love when the fog creeps in overnight. There is something eerie, yet magical about the way it silently fills the space between earth and sky.

But, this fog was different. It lingered just a few feet above the brown-gold fields, just high enough for the few deer grazing in the early light to look as if they were coming up for air. Their heads would dunk below the fog, nibble, then peek above the layers, just as if they were grazing the bottom of a slow-moving river. Magical.

And, as I drove slowly down Yosemite Street, towards the airport, the fog lifted and split through the trees, appearing like the contrails of jets and soon I was driving underneath their separated paths. For a moment, like the deer, it seemed I was submerged under feathery waves. Eerie.

I wish I’d had time to pull over and watch the fog as it disappeared into the nature trails across the road, only to slide down the bank and fill Cowskin Creek. As the sun rose purple-orange in the east, I imagined the fog cowering under its glare and vanishing into the blue sky.

As I drove on, I tried to recall the poem by Carl Sandburg which I had memorized as a middle school girl.  Just as silently as the morning fog itself, the poem crept into my memory:

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

What a beautiful way to begin the week.