Finding your Luck Fox

My parents stopped by on Sunday. The day had just blossomed, the heat burning off some of the thickness that is humidity that had weighed on my shoulders just minutes earlier. We stood in my driveway, my parents shaking their heads at how much work we’ve done in three months to get this land where we want it to be.

As as I typically do, I said, “there’s so much more to do,” and there is.

But then I turned away from our yard and faced the neighbor’s land.

I pointed to the hilly tree-lined pasture across from us, acres of undulating hills with ankle-tickling grasses and large trees.

“The fox likes to come out to play there, sometimes,” I raised my arm to point across at the edge of a creek. It was thirty, maybe thirty-five yards from me.

“In fact,” I said, after squinting for a moment, “she’s right there.”

And she was. The old orangey-brown turning white and gray fox had exited from the tree line and trotted midway across the field. She turned and watched us. If my voice could have been a shrug, it would have. Strangely I wasn’t surprised. It’s as though I had expected the creature to be there.

“Oh my goodness,” my mom said, “look Al, there! There!”

“Where?” my dad asked, and I pointed between two oaks. We leaned our bodies slowly, hesitant on frightening the fox, but wanting to keep her in our line of sight.

The fox watched us watching her, then pranced a little silly dance up towards the big red barn some acres away from us.

Now, here’s where I tell you something that might surprise you, or perhaps not:

In all of my travels in an RV across the states over two years, I never once saw a fox.

Deer? Oh my gosh, yes, so many. Rabbits the size of Volkswagon rabbits? Yes. Eagles, hawks, dogs on the sides of roads, manatees and alligators, snakes and raccoons and all sorts of tiny rodents and lizards. You get the point. But no fox.

On Sunday though, I wanted to show my parents a fox. And just like that, I did.

I read an article some years ago that claimed that people who say they are lucky are, in fact, luckier than others.

But there’s a simple reason for that. What is luck other than claimed opportunity? And when you really see yourself as lucky you’re simply looking for those opportunities to be lucky.

When we got into our RV nearly three years ago now, we didn’t get into it because we were looking for a bad experience. We were looking for opportunities, chances to get lucky to, ways to see the best in life as we traveled.

And me? Well, I wanted to see a lot of animals. So I did.

Owls. I have seen a lot of them as I mentioned in one of my pieces. And bats. My gosh, so many wonderful bats, swooping down over bodies of water catching bugs.

I don’t look for bats at noon on a sunny day though.

Same goes for owls.

Even now, after having settled down into a sticks-and-bricks, I often go outside into the humid life that is Tennessee a few minutes after the sun has set. To look for bats. I look up, between the big trees, into the sky, and wait for the sparkles of black that are best seen out of my peripheral. That’s when I see them.

I seek them out. I look to where they should be. Then, more often than not, with a little patience, I see them.

So when I wanted to see a fox on Sunday, and I saw one, was it fate? Or opportunity? Luck. I got lucky.

I can not summon foxes.

It’s kinda like life, isn’t it? You don’t see something until you take the time to look for it.

I know I’m fairly optimistic when it comes to nature, about finding the goodies that I seek out. My younger sister still lives in Oregon and I told her, “certainly you have bats where you live.” I told her, “go outside after the sun sets. When the sky is almost purple and the trees are black silhouettes. Then look up.”

She did. But no bats were to be seen.

So, sometimes there are bats. And other times they simply aren’t there.

Here’s another tip though, about nature, about seeing those bats, those foxes, finding those huge rabbits as you travel or stay in the same place, you can’t just do it once and say, “well, I tried,” if you’re not successful. Go back. Do it again.

I’m reading Owls of the Eastern Ice by Jonathan Slaight right now. I’m about 50 pages in, so there won’t be any spoilers, but the author talks about being in this incredibly small village in Russia in which the citizens aren’t too keen on outsiders. And he’s on day three of his journey of seeking out Blakiston’s fish owl, these insanely large owls, and in the author’s writing, it’s becoming apparent that he’s starting to doubt the reality of finding a fish owl. No signs of them. Until day three, when his research group finds old feathers from the fish owl woven into an abandoned bird nest. Each day and each night he goes back out, seeking along the icy river that bird. Because I haven’t finished the book I can’t say for certain, but if I had to guess, he stays repeating similar methods to find that danged owl. He is seeking them out.

Going to where they might live. Looking for them.

So, no, I cannot summon foxes, but when I want to find something, then, well, I look for it.

It’s like the fireflies. They aren’t exactly bright and shiny in the middle of the afternoon. But here’s the reality: they do exist in the day. Fireflies look like beetles. They hang out on my corn, by my beans, on my sunflowers. I notice them, but I don’t really take note of them.

I didn’t know what they were until I googled them. Then? I realized the opportunity, that chance to see something I really wanted, they were there all along. I just wasn’t looking for them. Wasn’t ready to see them yet.

I don’t appreciate fireflies in the daytime, but they don’t cease to exist simply because I’m not looking for them.

So, maybe that’s the thing — if you want to see a fox, or an alligator, or an owl, go to where you’re most likely to see them. Go to where the opportunities are.