September’s here. The full August moon is waning; never really appeared till after the fact, when low gray skies opened for a splendid, cool, clear, sunny weekend, great weather for opening the barn and letting warm, dry winds chase out lingering dampness.

The weekend was special for another reason. Grandson Jordie paid a solo visit, his first, midway through this, his fourth year. It was fun, as always, bright eyes to greet me each morning as I sat reading in my La-Z-Boy recliner, sun entering through the parlor window to brilliantly light my pages, warm me.

We went off Sunday morning to an outdoor chapel he’s grown fond of, for morning services along the Green River, where I daily walk my dogs at least once. This time, after setting the animals free from their crates on back of my truck, I pointed out a three-quarter ghost moon high in the western sky. Jordie was confused.

“Ghost moon?”

“Yes, pale yet prominent in the deep blue sky; ghostlike; shouldn’t be there.”

But there it was, a remnant from the night before, lit by the bright, low morning sun. He understood. On to another matter.

“Grampy, can I have your whistles? We don’t want to lose the dogs.”

“Yes, of course, but make sure you keep the lanyard around your neck so we don’t lose it; and, please, don’t overdo it with the whistles. Lily and Buddy will be confused if you use them too much. Only whistle when they’ve been out of sight for a while, have run off.”

Again, he got it, acknowledged so with sweet, innocent eye contact as we made our way to the galvanized gate separating the upper and lower meadows. When we reached the barway, he turned for the path skirting it through brush and I stopped him, pointed out crimson poison ivy, said it was no time to tempt the fates. We’d walk through the gate.

“Oh, I didn’t know you could open that gate. You never opened it before?”

“No need. Poison ivy is most dangerous this time of year.”

“Oh. I had poison ivy on my legs once. It’s itchy.”

I remembered.

We walked down the compacted farm road into Sunken Meadow and traipsed through ankle-high ryegrass and clover, dogs romping through the Christmas trees and into the thick wild-rosebush border, now impenetrable to humans. The animals would burst out of the tangle, romp through the meadow and return to the dense periphery, searching enthusiastically for fresh scent to chase, their energy infecting Jordie, savoring the cool, clear freedom entering his lungs, each inhale illuminating his warm hazel eyes.

Halfway down our first straightaway, Jordie suddenly picked up the pace into a joyful, foot-free trot or shuffle toward an obvious destination. He was headed for the wild, swamp apples; curious, wanting to check for fallen fruit. How did I know? Because I had shown him the trees the previous fall and was able to decipher his unsaid object of interest. The apples were small and green, few on the ground, much to the chagrin of Jordie and the dogs, which devour them as eagerly as wild beasts when available.

When we got to our second bend, confronted by a choice between circling back to the truck or continuing toward the river, Jordie opted for water, where he loves to play, poke around, walk through the stream in his wicked-cool “water shoes,” Keen sandals. At the river’s edge where we always stop, a pair of wooden picnic tables stood under another large apple tree shading the high, undercut bank overlooking a now undernourished river creeping toward Greenfield Pool. There, the dogs scoured the turf for drops, eating many small green apples as Jordie, his T-shirt draped over my right shoulder, played in the river, alarmed about an underwater “crab” fleeing along the gravel bed.

“That’s not a crab, Jordie,” I told him. “It’s a crayfish that looks like a crab. Don’t be afraid. It won’t bother you.”

“What are crayfish?”

“A freshwater crab, sort of; more like a little lobster.”

“Oh.”

After maybe 20 minutes, I was able to coax the boy out of the water and back toward the truck. I used the excuse that I had left my vehicle open and vulnerable to mischief. I wasn’t really concerned. He knew.

“You have the keys, Grampy.”

“Yes, I know, but we still must start back.”

“OK.”

When we were almost out of Sunken Meadow, facing the short, gentle ascent to the gate, I pointed to a female sumac clump along the lip, large conical bobs of drupes adding splashes of red to the lush green wetland.

“See those red cones on the short, green, bushy trees?” I asked, pointing.

“Yes.”

“Well, those are clumps of berries. The Indians used to make lemonade out of them.”

“You mean juice?”

“Yes, juice, sweetened with honey or maple sugar.”

“Yummmm. That sounds delicious,” … his words, not mine.

When we reached the gate, still ajar, we passed through and I refastened it before walking a short distance to my undisturbed vehicle. Jordie gave the dogs several short whistles and the goldenrod shook before they popped out of sumacs and onto the farm road. They greeted us, ran to the truck, hopped onto the tailgate and, eventually, into their crates, which I secured before re-entering the vehicle. Inside, I buckled Jordie’s seatbelt, then mine, and mentioned that the ghost moon had vanished. I was wrong. He looked up as I pulled away and corrected me.

“Grampy, there’s the ghost moon, right there (pointing).”

“Oh yes. I see it, much lower, resting on the horizon, ready to disappear.”

“Horizon?”

“Where the endless blue sky meets the mountains, right on the ridge-top overlooking Grampy’s house.”

“Oh, horizon, where the sky meets the mountains.”

Again, he understood.

“In a few minutes that moon’ll be gone,” I said.

“But that’s OK, Grampy, the sun is up.”

“Yes, Jordie, the sun is up and tonight the moon will reappear over there on the eastern horizon.”

“Why?”

“Because, it’ll be a new night. Then, when the sun rises tomorrow, it’ll be a new day. A smaller ghost moon will again disappear over the western horizon, and the sun will later follow it over the same ridge when night is near.”

He looked at me, pensive, asked why. Not an easy concept to comprehend. He will in time. I didn’t want to overload him with too much in one session, fearing confusion, that clueless cousin of curiosity.

Who knows? I may yet turn the boy into a pantheist — nature, dear to my heart and soul, his deity. We’ll avoid Boy Scout and alter-boy discipline, nudging him along instead with gentle, independent instruction from a loved one he trusts and respects. It’s unlikely the boy will become a cop or a soldier or a Walmart manager. Too independent.

I do hope nobody claims he’s been twisted by an alternative path, destined for the fires of non-comformist hell. That would be wrong.

Hateful.

Ignorant.