On the River

Nearly exhausted, I waded up river when I saw two buzzards standing in the shade on the bank. They were big, for a moment I thought they might be wild turkeys. As I got closer I saw that they were indeed buzzards and I kept wading, expecting them to fly off. They didn’t, they just watched me coming closer. Admittedly I was moving so slow that a turtle had passed me, swimming against the current at that. I wasn’t a threat to the buzzards moving that slow. I moved further into the river to go by them, edging out about thirty feet. I slowly moved by. They watched me intently. They put their heads together, I couldn’t hear what they were whispering, but I knew it was about me. After a minute I looked back and saw that they were following, walking along the river’s edge, keeping pace. It was no strain for them to keep up. I thought I heard them chanting in low voices “fall, fall, fall, fall”. That scared me enough that I picked up the pace. I moved so fast that I kept up with another turtle for the next fifty yards.