The sky is high and grey today. The kind of sky that, if it were winter, would mean cold drizzle all day and early dark, but today it just means no sun and not too hot. The apples on the tree are starting to bulge and be more than little knots on stems that you have to look hard to notice as something other than leaves curled by the summer heat. My setter has already begun eating the apples, searching the branches and holding little tugs of war with stems until she pulls one loose, to trot off across the yard and, holding it between her paws, eating carefully and delicately in little bites. I’ve never seen a dog eat apples before and I wondered if she was sick or not getting enough to eat, but no the doc says she just likes apples. Some dogs do. So I watch out the window as she stands on hind legs to reach a higher branch, a higher apple. She will do this all summer until the low branches are cleared and I will pick one now and then for her until they start to drop or wind fall in the first hot weeks of September. The tree ripens late, it’s that kind. Then she will pick them from the ground, only one or two a day and carry them over the backyard to a shady spot and eat, carefully. All fall she’ll do this until I’ve picked the branches and raked the droppings. Still a few will cling all winter, one or two dropping on occasion from a heavy rain or wind, and she will have a treat again, to last her until the first buds grow again next year.