I didn’t mean to end up in the shaman section, but that can happen when you are looking for books about trees. I was at the library. I couldn’t find the book about cottonwoods, so I had to ask the librarian for help, which made me feel about eight-years old. As the librarian lead the way, I noticed her legs because she wore a skirt. She had tattoos. Two jumped out at me on each leg below the knee, on the left was a colon, and on the right, a semi-colon. This was worth the trip to the library.
I’ve been inquisitive lately.
I went on a guided bird walk at Hendrick’s park this weekend. Sometimes I notice birds, special birds who are someone, but I don’t know who.
30 people showed up at 7:30 Sunday morning. It started out slow. It was not as slow as a lichen walk, which I have also done. No, things sped up after spotting a towhee and a song sparrow right out the gate. Our shoes crunched loudly on the gravel path and I was sure we’d neither see nor hear any more birds due to our massive crowd, all with binoculars dangling from necks.
I am aging into being a bird watcher now and I’m kind of excited about it.
“Look, isn’t it beautiful, like art?!” Pointing at an uprooted stump, spilling sideways, the woman next to me added, “but it was terrible when it happened!” I reflected on this. Tragedy can transform, ending up in the form of beauty.
The guides explained how to identify songs. Birds say things that sound like, “Chicago!” “Three beers!” “Trees! Trees! Trees!”
A few minutes later we heard a call, which a man translated quickly as, “Impeach! Impeach!”
Toward the end, our guides made us be quiet and wait and watch. A few feet away, a chickadee flew into the side of a stump to feed its young. There was no discernible doorway or entry point. It appeared to vanish into the bark at high speed.
By the end of the two hours, I was in the back of the group, tittering with other birders. Lost focus but having fun.
There is a call and there is a song, and they are different things. I will explain both in another blog, and how they apply to birds and people.
Birds we saw on the walk:
Red-breasted nut hatch
Song sparrow
Chikadee
Brown creeper
Cedar waxwing
Towhee
Anna’s hummingbird
Hutton’s vireo
Black-throated gray warbler
