Joy spills from diverse vignettes of everyday life. May your Valentine’s Day be as joyful as ours in watching a coyote from our window clowning around as playful as a puppy.

Sound effects in this rough footage in which I was able to capture the cunning coyote having a bit of fun at Mark’s driving range are provided by our feline Baja. Ever the peacemaker, Baja wants to befriend almost all the creatures that cross her path.

We don’t take such moments for granted. As Momaday points out more eloquently than I, it is a rare gift to see them so naturally.

“Coyotes have the gift of seldom being seen; they keep to the edge of vision and beyond, loping in and out of cover on the plains and highlands. And at night, when the whole world belongs to them, they parley at the river with the dogs, their higher, sharper voices full of authority and rebuke. They are an old council of clowns, and they are listened to.”
― N. Scott Momaday, House Made of Dawn

Coyote Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obTb57LsGm8&feature=youtu.be