Fiddle first, Tobin, an
unusually clever riversea otter with a round,
impressive belly, barely
squeezes through his sliver of a front door. Eager to leave
for rehearsal, he slings his fiddle case
across his back and faces Arbor Way. But, before he can
take a single step, a thought, like a whiff, catches his
nose. He hesitates.
“Rain?” Tobin sniffs.
“Could be,” he ponders
and hops down the first stone
step
from front door to garden.
“Might be,” he
wonders, on the second hop.
Reveling in the smell of rain
promised, Tobin raises his snout and sings:
Oh to be a fiddler, a fiddler I would be,
I’d play all around about the Mad River Val-ley.
I’d play at night, when the moon is full,
I’d play at morn awash with dew.
Collecting raindrops from nature's playground
River to mountain all is full of
sound. . .
