Fir Cones on Labor Day

I’m sitting on the rock at the entrance to the Cretan labyrinth in the side yard. A visitor once named this labyrinth “Mother and Child” because of the dark stones enclosing the white stones.

A frog croaks from the trees on my right. A squirrel whistles. The squirrels have been dropping fir cones from the tops of the tall Douglas firs—a sign of the coming winter.

Birds twitter on three sides. The little magenta flowers at the labyrinth center are in bloom. A miracle, really, at the end of this long, dry summer: I haven’t watered the labyrinth once.