The bats are out, downtown is loaded with old warehouses and towers, just perfect for a roost. I have driven by old buildings at this time of early evening, and have seen waves of them come out of empty windows, gaps in brick walls. Many church steeples are havens, and thus in the midst of the city, groups of bats will stream down to the structures by the water, where caddis flies breed in monstrous number.

Swooping through the menu of the evening is a little company of bats outside my windows--they gyre about in a very erratic, fluttering pattern, daredeviling the brick walls of the tenth floor. We have swallows here also, thinner, longer, speedier than the bats, but their venue is just before sunset, right after the bugs come out. As you can guess, it is insectopolis here. But I am glad for the bats.

When I lived in the most beautiful stone house in the world, the back was overgrown with thick bushes along the perimeter, a gathering place for tiny flighted bugs. Every night at eight-thirty in the summer, one single little brown bat would do his bat job, circling and circling over the yard, catching dinner. He was faithful for the season. I let him be a comfort to me, but our Siamese Eggy yodeled suggestions of companionship, a table for two, if only the little thing would come close enough to be grabbed by Eggy's monkey-cat arms.

I look up now to see a plum colored sky, an occasional bat working hurriedly for supper.