The Tale of My Winged Escorts

We're all just walking each other home. - Ram Dass.

When I got out of bed and saw the weather map online, I realized I needed to get out for my walk quickly before the rain. So out I went, but not alone. Oh, never alone.

Before I had gotten far, which is to say the bad corner just past our house, I spotted a red flash. The male cardinal, and then his mate! I stopped to snap a few pictures. Heard a sound behind me: what now?

It was a rabbit! We stood stock still regarding each other, both of us afraid to move. It was in the middle of the road and I feared a car would come and then we'd both be squashed. But the rabbit took matters into its own paws. With a hop and a jump, it went past me, took shelter in a copse of trees.

I continued on, then stopped to photograph some water droplets on leaves. Saw another red flash. What? The red birds again? And then, as I headed over onto Hemlock, I discovered two small brown birds, making love or war.

Turns out it was love, but don't they look a lot the same sometimes! Ahem. I'll give them their privacy and NOT share any of the pictures I took! Anybody got a cigarette? (Husband: Only YOU could find bird porn on your morning walk!)

And then, as I was standing there, marveling at how active our bird population was between the rains, the cardinal pair appeared again. The male was on the ground, but the female flew up into a pretty flowered tree, where she sat and sang, and I got a bunch of lovely shots, including the one above.

I turned the corner onto Stonerow, took some more water droplet pictures, admired the maple samaras hanging everywhere. They truly are works of art, each and every one. (I am one who stuffs them into my pockets - who knows why - then pulls them out, puzzled, days later, to find them crumbling to dust.) Then back home I went.

As I rounded the bad corner heading for our house, I thought I saw another flash of red. Then another, a bit less red. The cardinal and his mate who accompanied me the entire way were walking me home!

What does all of this mean? I think I have some kind of "bird-shining" right now, after two bird rescues in the past month. The latest rescue was a female cardinal who hit the window and had to be pried from the jaws of the neighbors' cat, LGK.

I remember holding that bird's little body in my hands. The female cardinal was (literally) light as a feather. It was chilly that day and I lifted her up to my heart, hoping she'd find warmth there; hoping she'd live. All around me, I heard cardinals calling that morning.* They knew one of their own was in peril.

And then that little gal flapped, and she flapped some more, and finally she BIT me, and I realized she was ready to go. I lifted her to place her onto a branch in a tree in the yard, but as soon as my hand opened, she flew away, straight and strong as an arrow!

Now, was this bird in this photo the same bird I rescued? Was this one the mother of that bird? Or a relative of some kind? I can't be sure, for a bird in the hand looks MUCH MUCH different than one in the bush!

I think the animals know more than we give them credit for. I think they can see into us, see who we are, gauge our intentions, either for good or for ill. I have told you once and I will tell you again: I know for whom the female cardinal sings. She sings for me.  <3

I want a lovely song for this sweet girl, be she my rescued beauty, or her mother, or merely an appreciative relative.The soundtrack is from Flashdance; here is Joe Esposito, with Lady, Lady, Lady.

*This bizarre thought has also occurred to me, and so I've come back here to add it: I wonder if our chatty cardinals have a word in their language that stands for ME!