By Anne W. Semmes
“Hope is a thing with feathers,” and yes, hope came from a back-country friend of the discovery of a mourning dove nest – never seen before. “This lovely brave lady is sitting on a nest in the holly tree just by my front door,” my friend shared. “She’s keeping at least one wee babe warm.”
A positively frameable photo arrived of that mourning dove frozen-in-love on her nest. My friend had earlier found half an eggshell before the tree and puzzled over what bird had produced it. Perhaps the nuthatch. She’d seen the nuthatch with a stinkbug in its mouth “to warn off other birds away from its nest,” she surmised. But the arriving electrician had all the right answers and located the mourning bird nest. “She did not move when the electrician and I saw her,” she said.
What a gift! In this challenging time of social distancing!
My friend had also shared a curious site in nearby woods of a gnawed away fallen log. What animal could have made such a pile of wood chips, she asked. Some small mammal I guessed. “But Ted would know.” But, oh, Ted Gilman of Audubon Greenwich is now in Indiana, retired as of a month ago. But that gnawed log photo made its way to him.
“The mystery animal breaking up the log is a pileated woodpecker,” came the answer, “as shown by the large rectangular hole along the side of the log. It probably found a rich supply of beetle larvae to feed on.” Ted from the field!
Thank goodness for the phone, and for that Internet, when the argument was growing of how those iPhones are isolating. They are lifesaving. They bring us together when we must be apart.
A friend called yesterday, asking a dark question, “Is this hello or goodbye?” She’s giving me a reality check. She’s not the first friend addressing our mortality in this dark time. But she was reaching out to touch a friend she valued in her life, for which I am grateful. Later, another friend, not seen in a while, called suggesting we go out to our favorite restaurant soon, and “eat anything we want!” How soon is soon?
I think of my children’s families, how they are all home together, from school, from exhausting jobs. How some parents’ returning adult children are being quarantined in their houses, being fed via paper plates.
Perhaps this social distancing time can connect families in new and meaningful ways, with kids asking questions of their parents they might never have asked, like what was it like when they were growing up? What were the takeaways from their parents’ parents?
An extraordinary gift arrived in my mailbox a week or so ago. It held a love letter from someone important in my family life, someone expressing love I never expected to see. I had to wonder, was this message inspired beneath the darkening cloud of COVID-19?
If so, it points again to this being a time to share the immense value that people play in our life – friends and family. With my family much removed, my friends matter greatly. I’m looking forward to walking and talking with them, yes, five feet apart. And, maybe, just maybe I’ll spy those ospreys returned to their Byram nest. “Hope springs eternal!”
