These events unfolded in front of my camera at dawn on June 18, 2007. I had gotten up in the dark and walked out to the end of a narrow, sandy peninsula that juts out into the forest surrounding Purity Springs lake in northeast New Hampshire. When a narrow blade of sunlight hit the far shore behind a rust-colored fallen white pine, I turned on the camera. As a stiletto of sun widens imperceptibly through the woods and across the steaming water, a loon suddenly pops up in the middle of the gold sunlight and spreads its wings. Then she (or he) swims leisurely toward the camera, cleaning her wings along the way. Finally, she turns to her right and then stretches her magnificent wings once more, before gliding off stage.
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