Sunday, Sparrows, Sawsan (do unto others as….)

April 14, 2024April 14, 2024 ~ Live & Learn ~ 68 Comments

I knew when I took the shot this morning it would be a triggering moment for Sawsan who swoons over Sparrows.

Then I posted the shot on Instagram. In seconds, a text message comes flying in: “POST the Sparrow, PLEASE.”

Then message alerts won’t stop: Ping Ping Ping Ping Ping PING. PING. She lights up my inbox after I ask her to share a few thoughts on why I should post the picture.

I was a bit taken back — she said ‘PLEASE‘ vs. the customary JUST-DO-IT. Finally, a wee bit of control over Her on Something. I feel such joy over this…

Sawsan said it all started here with my post: Riding Metro North. With “My” Little Bird.’

Then she shares a passage from Thoreau in ‘Walden‘: “I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment, while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance that I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn.”

I had to look up “epaulet.”

I re-read the passage, and thought about the summer afternoon when the kids and I went to Cove Island Park. I had Birdie (our Sun Conure) on my shoulder — and, the kids were a least one hundred yards behind me, belly crawling in the grass, nope, don’t know him, never saw him before in our life.

But we digress.

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“What you do when you’re not working, not being productive…”

April 2, 2024April 2, 2024 ~ Live & Learn ~ 42 Comments

“…Birding has tripled the time I spend outdoors. It has pushed me to explore Oakland in ways I never would have: Amazing hot spots lurk within industrial areas, sewage treatment plants and random residential parks. It has proved more meditative than meditation. While birding, I seem impervious to heat, cold, hunger and thirst. My senses focus resolutely on the present, and the usual hubbub in my head becomes quiet. When I spot a species for the first time — a lifer — I course with adrenaline, while being utterly serene…

“When I step out my door in the morning, I take an aural census of the neighborhood, tuning in to the chatter of creatures that were always there and that I might previously have overlooked. The passing of the seasons feels more granular, marked by the arrival and disappearance of particular species instead of much slower changes in day length, temperature and greenery. I find myself noticing small shifts in the weather and small differences in habitat. I think about the tides…

Of course, having the time to bird is an immense privilege. As a freelancer, I have total control over my hours and my ability to get out in the field. “Are you a retiree?” a fellow birder recently asked me. “You’re birding like a retiree.” I laughed, but the comment spoke to the idea that things like birding are what you do when you’re not working, not being productive.

I reject that. These recent years have taught me that I’m less when I’m not actively looking after myself, that I have value to my world and my community beyond ceaseless production, and that pursuits like birding that foster joy, wonder and connection to place are not sidebars to a fulfilled life but their essence.

It’s easy to think of birding as an escape from reality. Instead, I see it as immersion in the true reality. I don’t need to know who the main characters are on social media and what everyone is saying about them, when I can instead spend an hour trying to find a rare sparrow. It’s very clear to me which of those two activities is the more ridiculous. It’s not the one with the sparrow.

— Ed Yong, from “When I Became a Birder, Almost Everything Else Fell Into Place (NY Times, March 30, 2024)

Photo: DK @ Cove Island Park, March 31, 2024. Canada Geese at sunrise. More photos from that morning here.

They’re back…

March 22, 2024March 22, 2024 ~ Live & Learn ~ 19 Comments

Atlantic Brant’s are back for a pit stop before heading north. More pictures from this morning’s walk here.

If you’ve never heard the call of an Atlantic Brant, listen here. “The Atlantic brant makes a low, guttural ruk-ruk sound, and its call pattern is flat, rising, and undulating. Brant also make a guttural crrrronk when flying or on the ground, and a shorter, sharper cruk alarm call. (via Google)”

Walking. Like a Pissant.

March 21, 2024March 21, 2024 ~ Live & Learn ~ 44 Comments

3:30 am.

Wally skooches (sp?) up from under the covers and gives me kisses. How does one not smile at this wonderful creature, even this hour. Wally needs to go wee-wee. He races out to the end of the yard, does his business, and comes bolting back, doing a full body shake in flight to shake the cold off — Wally wants no part of what’s outside at this hour. And I can’t blame him.

I shiver, look up, and there’s Moon, in her full glory. I grab the camera and take the shot— best to have something to show for this unexpected Call-of-Wally-Duty at this hour. (Shot here.)

5:30 am.

1,416 consecutive (almost) days on this daybreak walk at Cove Island Park. Like in a Row.

Susan reminded me last night that it’s the first day of Spring. I wondered if I forgot to push the clock back a month with the time change. The thermometer reads 29 F°, but there is no way in Hell it’s remotely close to that. Wind gusts up to 25 mph are blowing (I mean BLOWING) off Long Island Sound, and miraculously finding every exposed piece of flesh, which is a miracle in itself given that I’m 4-layered up. Shiver, again.

There are only 4 of us out in the Park this morning, the Regulars, with King Lunatic out front. “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.” Well, mostly true here, except the gloom or sheets of rain can present temporary obstacles.

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