Little Losses

      

     A few weekends ago, I was stepping into the shower and a robin caught my eye from the bathroom window ledge. I wanted to step out and backwards and go get my camera, but I reasoned that photos would only show how long  I had not washed my windows and that even those movements would most likely make the bird take flight. So I just waited and enjoyed this close encounter, which quickly elevated (or degenerated, depending on how much time you have) to what, as elementary school students, we used to call a 'mexican stand-off.' The bird wouldn't even blink.... It occurred to me that it might be sick. I did not dare to hope it was roosting. My time constraints got the better of me, and I turned on the water... still no movement. This all ended the minute I brought my hand to head to lather the shampoo I applied to my hair. Off she went. That arm, from an expanse of maybe 5 inches through the pane, must have been finally too close for comfort. When the morning's ablutions were complete, I trekked around the house to the backyard to see a rather substantial nest. I walked around the yard and tried to note any frantic calls, searched the trees for the mama, but nothing. I wondered why on earth this bird chose THAT location. She obviously wasn't paying attention to the morning routines at our house... but then I remembered we had been gone for a spring break and maybe this was the time she was scouting. I looked from ledge to the ground beneath it, where my husband had turned over the earth in garden preparation and I quickly texted him that we would have to talk about the garden plan... that he should slowly approach that area of the backyard and focus on said window sill and we would talk about it later. I fully expected the outcome of that discussion would be that we would be finding another location for our 'nine bean rows.'  The next day he said he turned over the ground again.... Mama Bird, in audience this time, seemed to take his activity in stride so he concluded that he'd leave things as is...except for the bathroom window, which we covered from the inside so she wouldn't be disturbed every time we reached for the Pantene. A few days later he told me he was worried about the nest. Two crows came sailing out of that corner of the yard  as he approached the day before and he hadn't seen the robin since. The next day he checked from inside the house. Peering in from the tub he only saw an empty nest. Damn crows.

     Last weekend as I was just getting dressed and ready to go run errands, he came into the house and said "Come here, Nature Girl," ('cause you  know, I AM) and led me to my kitchen window ledge garden.... There, resting on the soil in the pot with the pointy ivy was a tiny, luminous egg. He had discovered  it on the lawn while he was mowing, My first thought was to see if it was still warm...and rapid-fire subsequent mental images focused on makeshift incubators. I quickly came to my senses. I would have no idea how to raise a mourning dove. And the egg was quite cold after all. All that was left to think and say was, again,  "Damn Crows." And, of course, take some photographs.

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As always, click on photo to enlarge.