It's all gone to the birds ...

I live in the house I grew up in. It's physically located in the second-oldest (historical) neighborhood in this metro area of 3/4 million, and we're up on a hill - on the 'wrong' side of town. That's so funny - living on the 'wrong' side, as opposed to the 'right' one, whatever that means. [That's something that we hear CONSTANTLY on the news, see in the paper, hear on the street - and the people who say that with absolute authority and certitude, have never been on this side of town, know nothing about it, have never even seen pictures of it - because they don't care, or maybe they're just scared of the bogey man (and he looks like Willy Horton, if you live in Tulsa).]

Anyway, I got my cuppa this morning, ran out on the front porch and listened to the accursed (just kidding!) mocking bird singing his HEART out from his favorite perch in the tree, like he does every morning. Sucker woke me up, in fact. You'd think that, as HOT as it is this week, he'd be cooling his claws INSIDE a nice, cool, green leafy tree - BUT NO. He's an interesting part of every day around here. There are (were) Bradford pears in my yard, pre-ice storm of December, 2007. Mr. Mockingbird lived in one of them - still does in the piece of one that is left. The tree is tall still even with its center branch (the tallest) broken out/off. He and his mate of the season nest in that tree every year, and raise his latest crop of offspring - at least, until he finally chases them away at the end of fall ... The broken branch didn't fall off the tree altogether, so we cut it out. Made a rather big hole in the middle of the tree. Anyway, when spring came, the tree leafed out anyway along that wound, just like the unbroken branches did, and I noticed quickly that Mr. Mockingbird was still hanging in, in the same place he always has. He sits on that branch - what's left of it, he's built a nest in the break, and he sings all day, from that oh-so-precarious perch. Every time it storms, every time the wind blows, we're afraid the tree will finish coming down - it will hit the house, the nest will fall, it will hit the neighbor's house - something. But, I can't find it in my to cut it down - the birds love it. They didn't give up on it, they took the chance that their home would shelter them anew - and it did. And he's bold as brass - I'm on the porch, drinking my coffee, and he's flown off the tree and perched on the porch railing.

What's the world come to when I can't even frighten a mockingbird?

Funny thing, though - he's not the only winged thing hanging around. I was lounging out in the backyard around sunup a few days ago, and two eagles flew overhead ... the Furry Idiots went berzerk, and FLEW into the dog house.

We are near the local dam (25 miles), and bald eagles nest there every year. We're also on the migration path, so, as they teach the eyases to fly, we see them overhead. They LOVE Tiger, apparently, and hope to have him for lunch. They're always diving at him. When he was smaller, we couldn't let him out alone - blasted eagles were buzzing the house and landing on the retaining wall. And how beautiful they are!

However, any bird that stands half as high as I do isn't a comfortable sight, up close and personal. I'd rather they stay in the air.

We also see red-tailed hawks, and once, a barn owl landed on the porch railing, right at dusk, while I was outside. He must have been looking for supper - we have bunnies - and I never heard him. I felt him go by though - the stir in the air - and it was more about what I DIDN'T hear that got my attention.

For a split second, there was absolute silence as he passed - you can't hear an owl's wings flap like other birds, but I could feel something to my right and behind me. AND OH LORD HE WAS A BIG-UN. By the time I registered just what I was looking at, he'd flown over to the big Douglas fir at the retaining wall. And not a sound. Just GREAT BIG YELLOW EYES. Owls don't blink much, either. That was truly awesome - the sight of that bird in flight was enough to take my breath away. I feel privileged to have seen him.

Hard to believe I live 3 miles from downtown on the 'wrong' side of town, isn't it? And I am D***ED glad that the sadiddy folk on the right side of town think that we're all running up and down the streets shooting each other over here - they never come this way, consequently, and don't know that we have the best city-scape views, from our hill, that you can find in this part of the state, along with all the pluses of country living - peace and quiet, huge home lots, low property taxes, abundant wild life, streets that anyone's kids can wander around safely (during daylight, anyway), neighbors who look out for one another, and no traffic to speak of ... SIGH - heaven on earth, for those in the know ... I'm GLAD-GLAD-GLAD that I'm one of them .